Saracens

🏺  Saracens

Overview

The Saracens are one of the strongest and most unbalanced civilizations in the game. Their combination of powerful siege, elite camels, and a superior economy gives them dominance in nearly every matchup. With their unique unit, the Mameluke, they have no meaningful weakness — every threat can be countered easily through superior stats, flexibility, and micro potential.

Strengths

• Camels: Among the strongest in the game, with +25% HP, making them durable, fast, and efficient against cavalry.

• Unique Unit – Elite Mameluke:
  The Elite Mameluke is arguably the most overpowered unit in the entire game when used correctly.

  • Anti-cavalry and anti-infantry: Deals bonus damage against cavalry, elephants, and still wipes infantry.

  • High stats: Excellent HP, speed, and attack power.

  • Micro potential: Can take out siege and perform hit-and-run tactics effectively.

  • Attack type: Uses melee-ranged damage, bypassing most pierce armor and rendering traditional counters ineffective.

  • Attack speed: Fast and consistent, allowing them to overwhelm units before they can respond.
    When micro-managed properly, a group of Elite Mamelukes can destroy virtually any army — cavalry, infantry, siege, or elephants — while suffering minimal losses.

• Siege: Access to Siege Onagers that instantly eliminate ranged armies and tightly packed units.

• Economy:

  • Only 5% market fee on trades, granting near-unlimited resource flexibility.

• Versatility: Their tech tree covers nearly every area of combat, leaving no exploitable gaps.
  
  

Weaknesses

• Theoretical vulnerability to archers, since many of their units take heavy pierce damage.
  However, in practice, this weakness is completely negated by Siege Onagers and Elite Mamelukes, which make ranged units irrelevant.
  
  

Proposed Fixes

• Reduce Mameluke and Elite Mameluke melee attack by 2.
  
  

Effect

• Keeps Mamelukes strong versus cavalry but removes their dominance against infantry and siege.

• Forces more balanced army composition and micro-based play.
  
  

Design Reasoning
The Mameluke currently wins too many matchups due to its excessive melee attack, giving it power far beyond its intended anti-cavalry role.
Reducing melee damage restores fair unit interactions while keeping the Saracens fast and versatile.
The Mameluke remains an anti-cavalry specialist — dangerous to horses but no longer a universal frontline brawler.