How to beat
Rusas Byzantine
Matchup tips
Walls make it virtually impossible for horse archers to do anything. You cannot just run by the opponent's eco and pick off villagers because you're never going to get through those walls.
Javelin throwers completely take Rus horse archers out of the equation, and with the permanent camel rider debuff against their cavalry, you turn a cavalry civilization into a mass infantry one — which doesn't feel good for Rus.
Javelin throwers also give you an opening to block a fast castle strat from Rus. The Byzantines have really good timing with a Cheirosiphon build into a javelin thrower push; you can catch them as they're building their landmark.
Against Rus, you can play greedy as Byzantines because you have such great counter units. Placing the Grand Winery between two berry bushes can boost your javelin thrower production significantly.
Once you get the second batch of javelin throwers, they become really threatening to archers because you can one-shot them.
Limitanei's damage reduction is really effective against Streltsy's spread damage over time.
With five cisterns and the Golden Horn Tower, it's very possible that the Byzantines can outmass Rus even with the bonus deer income.
Rus gets faster moving warrior monks, but with the Cistern boost influencing Grand Winery, you can make a monk within 15 seconds on cistern level five upon hitting castle age.
What do you want to make as a mercenary unit? One unit that immediately jumps out to you has to be the javelin throwers. Not only because they do a lot of bonus damage up against the cav archers, but also because you have more mobility than normal archers. As the game goes on, you will also get access to the camels. And with the camels, you are going to have camel onagers working for you as well. That's just a great synergy that can come in here for the Byzantines up against the Rus.
With the Limitanei and the javelin throwers for the Byzantines, I feel like they're better shifting kind of away from horsemen because yeah, they have the speed to catch up to the scout, but they don't pack the punch.
Well they get Limitanei with Shield Wall. Most of the damage from the Horse Archer is just base damage, so you still get a big reduction on that. The Limitanei do bonus damage to the cav archers as well, and behind that you got units like the Longbowman or potentially the Javelin Thrower, so great answer to that unit as well.
Varangian Guard are proving to be a decent front line against the Horse Archers and the Men-at-Arms, but if you get enough of those Horse Archers they're going to rip through the Varangian Guard.
There is a thought that with Byzantines against Rus, the play is Limitanei Javelin Thrower all-in.
Byzantines are more like timing in this particular matchup. If the matchup becomes about Siege, we have to remember that Rus had the advantage of just High Armory discounting the mangonel, and Byzantines going Foreign Engineering Company don't have the advantage of mangonels there — it's Nest of Bees which are heavily nerfed. So I do think for Byzantine it's probably a better idea to try and end the game in Castle.
The ultimate counter to Horse Archers being walls, and the Longbowmen not going to be doing too badly either.
Responsible Golden Horn Tower here at the back. Honestly, you want to make sure you get those free units, and just like we said before, you are dealing with Rus that has unlimited food and you need to survive that power spike.
Rus Unique Units
Rus Landmarks
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