How to beat
Ayyubidas Holy Roman Empire
Matchup tips
When your opponent is stuck in Feudal and you have a fishing boom, go Burgrave Palace as HRE.
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.
Possibility of a Burgrave build here. I doubt it, just because Ayyubid is one of the hardest to do it against.
It's kind of tough to play range units against Ayyubids a lot of the time. Not only because of the Camel Lancers, but the potential for one of the best siege in the game.
You don't really have the timing to get much damage done as HRE. And if you just rush castle, you might get there first as HRE, but the economy for ayyubids is actually going to be way stronger in that initial castle phase. And it's going to be a free ramp up for them into their timing with the camel lancers, with the archers, and god forbid.
Honestly, the man at arms with horsemen is unironically a better composition against what Numidon is building right now than knight as well as spearman. The heavy maces are good enough against knights and camel lancers, and horsemen do better against archers technically than knights do.
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 skirmishers only have one ranged armor, not like javelin throw. So archers and mass, especially from HR with the bonus movement speed, can definitely fight up against them.
The skirmishers only have one ranged armor, unlike javelin throwers. So archers in mass, especially from HRE with the bonus movement speed, can definitely fight up against them.
The HRE Men-at-Arms, with the +6 damage against heavy units, are going to be quite competitive even against knights or Camel Lancers.
HRE doesn't just need to deny relics from Ayyubids, they need to actively secure them. It's not just that Ayyubids can pick up relics quickly with dervishes; HRE needs those relics for the Regnitz Cathedral build.
Without a springald emplacement, an Outpost isn't going to kill anything against Ayyubids, courtesy of the dervish healing.
Against Ayyubid, if you're not getting the full sweep, their dervish heal is broken. It's better to wait and take a more decisive fight than engage piecemeal.
Men-at-arms, one of your strongest power units in the age, don't do very well against Ayyubids early on because they always have those pesky fast-moving archers.
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.
Ayyubid camels can construct siege, so they can build mangonels flexibly. Mangonels are super effective against large balls of crossbows in Castle Age because you can't dodge the shots.
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.
Ayyubid Unique Units
Ayyubid Landmarks
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