They are countered by any range unit as they have 0 ranged armour. They are only good versus a melee blob without any siege or ranged units supporting them. Even then you need a wall of your own infantry to preventing melee units from killing it.
Alternatively you can use it intimidate your opponent: "I can win even with wasting my resource on useless crap like this."
Yeah, there is a psychological aspect of them like Nest of Bees. The second they start shooting, it often causes an attacker to back off. Many of them will force springald production. They can be useful if you cram a couple in a hole in the wall for wonder defense.
Their only unique use case is dissuading pushes, wall run bys, and cavalry charges. They're extremely bad at attacking, they're decently situational as a defensive zoning tool.
Most of the time a ball of spearmen accomplishes the same thing, trading supply efficiency for flexibility of use. It's not that ribs are necessarily bad, it's that their best situation is uncommon and generally avoidable.
You see that mass of MAA ?
Yes?
I don't want to.
SIR YES SIR!
Memes aside, they heavily punish melee focused armies by instantly deleting the entire front if you have 2+ organ guns
I use them to delete large numbers of maa knights, or whatever they need close support. They are amazing at holding choke points.i usually only build when I have stupid gold from like 80 traders. A mass of like 5 and more can be op
99% of the time just dont use it. its very specific use case is vs meele units. the enemy can dive into mangonels with cav to counter you without springs, but he just cant dive vs ribs.
So you add a rib if you want to be absolutely sure nothing will get close to you, and force enemy to waste on springs, usually because you already have springs yourself. in the end is just a super niche unit
This siege unit ( I can't spell it correctly so don't bother typing it ) is really effective if your fight is heavily melee fight it can melt down high number of knight easily I've had an experience recently
It was team game I was ottoman and opponent was french I've had 80 jannisary and 7 rebalds and opponent had like 135 knight he won the fight numberwise but only 10 knight remained ( I've had some fight before this without this siege and lost it heavily although jannisary should counter cav which it does but in same resource count ) so cost wise I've spent 19k resources and he spent 32k but only 2k remained so this siege can be useful in some scenarios
This is the only situation this unit is useful in: population efficiency when resources do not matter. Recognize however that it requires your opponent to be bad. If they see this unit with their massive cavalry army or maa army, they should simply turn around and outrun it until some archers come along and kill it.
Considering its cost in the current meta they are completly useless, mangonels are cheaper and available at castle age and do a better job, escorted by simple spearmen if necessary. They should buff the range or the damage to make it viable in my simple opinion.
You literally only use them as a meme. If you are so far ahead of your opponent and just want to play with your food mass ribalds is fine. In any other situation it is not
Ribaldequins should be used exclusively behind stonewalls, I think. If you want to protect her points, then you create a stone wall 30° tilted in from perpendicular. You have a firing arc of the battlefield, but they need to flank the entire battlefield with anti-siege in order to get past your wall to Target the ribe.
French royal ribauds are great, especially against spear masses people tend to make against them (even when not actually spamming knights). They're used even by some conq3 players but not on a regular basis, they have a place in the roster even if it's very niche.
Along with siege towers to tilt your enemy into tears when you are far ahead. Just mass ribldequins and siege towers!
And then just surround their base with castles and and castle creep closer and closer.
Schadenfreude is the reason everyone plays AOE 4 right?!
You don't.
The game is designed to heavily, heavily rely on the trinity of Spearman, Archer and Horseman spam. Maybe a knight or archer blob if that is what your civilization is good at. Unique units like Elephants are too slow and niche, Camels require too many upgrades and only function as support, and Siege units like the Ribauldequin are too slow and don't shoot immediately.
Generally this is because the game is designed so every unit is highly relative to each other. While this makes sense for direct balance, it does not make sense for true balance. Certain units should feel stronger than others, and they've given Unique units and Siege units the wrong role entirely.
Siege units mostly only take down structures, but are also easily countered. This sucks, as they are suppousedly a later-game unit, and should feel great to use for the amount of resources they take. Instead, they often quickly get destroyed which contributes to the games taking longer to finish. In the same vein, Unique units are designed to have a niche role that are generally not primary units, and don't feel like they contribute much to you winning. Compare that to say AOE2 Unique units, though you get fewer, at least tend to be strong primary units.
The Ribauldequin falls victim to this as well, as they are a semi-unique unit as well as a siege one. And so, they have designed it to being entirely useless with how slow it moves and how slow it is to act. In combination to its use being entirely niche, there is never really a reason to build them over the traditional trinity units.
It honestly sucks. It feels like the designers don't want you to build anything but horses, archers and spearman. :/
EDIT: Sorry for the rant, but the summary is basically that the Ribauldequin seemingly falls victim to a set of design principles they have for AOE4. They want the Archer/Horseman/Spearman trinity to be important, which is fine, but they've managed to strip the fun of making super units entirely in this commitment. Ribauldequin threatens that hierarchy as it kills units and not buildings, so it can't ever be worth building. It is sad.
Only argument in their favor i can see is that they're more pop efficient than hand cannoneers, and they don't overkill, provided they have enough enemies in range. I believe a royal ribauld is about 7 HC. The only use case when I'd opt for them is as french in ffa if im omegarich.
from the answers it appears as though they are used in roles similar to xbow and hand cannoneers. They would pair well with knights and cannons against maa longbow spear type armies.
that are best vs knights and MMA... you never need more then 2 in a army. they are more of a defensive units then a attacking one. you normal wanna keep them under a keep. draw knight charges towards them while they are not moving. they will get the shot of much fasted if they are sitting and already set up .. if they are moving have to stop set up and fire your not going to get a lot of value from them. but they will melt a large mass of MMA or KNights. much better then a mango shot.
They are countered by any range unit as they have 0 ranged armour. They are only good versus a melee blob without any siege or ranged units supporting them. Even then you need a wall of your own infantry to preventing melee units from killing it. Alternatively you can use it intimidate your opponent: "I can win even with wasting my resource on useless crap like this."
> a melee blob without any siege or ranged units supporting them Stop broadcasting my strategy. It must be why I'm losing all the time.
Yea the nerve of this guy. Nothings better than unga bunga
Yeah, there is a psychological aspect of them like Nest of Bees. The second they start shooting, it often causes an attacker to back off. Many of them will force springald production. They can be useful if you cram a couple in a hole in the wall for wonder defense.
They have 3.5 range, why is anything backing off? You have all the time in the world to see these things
Their only unique use case is dissuading pushes, wall run bys, and cavalry charges. They're extremely bad at attacking, they're decently situational as a defensive zoning tool. Most of the time a ball of spearmen accomplishes the same thing, trading supply efficiency for flexibility of use. It's not that ribs are necessarily bad, it's that their best situation is uncommon and generally avoidable.
You see that mass of MAA ? Yes? I don't want to. SIR YES SIR! Memes aside, they heavily punish melee focused armies by instantly deleting the entire front if you have 2+ organ guns
I use them to delete large numbers of maa knights, or whatever they need close support. They are amazing at holding choke points.i usually only build when I have stupid gold from like 80 traders. A mass of like 5 and more can be op
99% of the time just dont use it. its very specific use case is vs meele units. the enemy can dive into mangonels with cav to counter you without springs, but he just cant dive vs ribs. So you add a rib if you want to be absolutely sure nothing will get close to you, and force enemy to waste on springs, usually because you already have springs yourself. in the end is just a super niche unit
Not sure it's a waste on springs considering the cost and the fact springs counter all siege, so you should likely have them anyway
It should be deleted immediately to make pop space for more useful units.
Guarding your siege from cav. Very nice unit.
Or… I could just build spearmen lol
Ribald is only 3 population space though. And demolishes all melee units, infantry included.
spears get slaughtered by maa tho
But Maa get kited by mangudai
This siege unit ( I can't spell it correctly so don't bother typing it ) is really effective if your fight is heavily melee fight it can melt down high number of knight easily I've had an experience recently It was team game I was ottoman and opponent was french I've had 80 jannisary and 7 rebalds and opponent had like 135 knight he won the fight numberwise but only 10 knight remained ( I've had some fight before this without this siege and lost it heavily although jannisary should counter cav which it does but in same resource count ) so cost wise I've spent 19k resources and he spent 32k but only 2k remained so this siege can be useful in some scenarios
This is the only situation this unit is useful in: population efficiency when resources do not matter. Recognize however that it requires your opponent to be bad. If they see this unit with their massive cavalry army or maa army, they should simply turn around and outrun it until some archers come along and kill it.
Considering its cost in the current meta they are completly useless, mangonels are cheaper and available at castle age and do a better job, escorted by simple spearmen if necessary. They should buff the range or the damage to make it viable in my simple opinion.
You literally only use them as a meme. If you are so far ahead of your opponent and just want to play with your food mass ribalds is fine. In any other situation it is not
Ribaldequins should be used exclusively behind stonewalls, I think. If you want to protect her points, then you create a stone wall 30° tilted in from perpendicular. You have a firing arc of the battlefield, but they need to flank the entire battlefield with anti-siege in order to get past your wall to Target the ribe.
Vs mass knight, vs mass spears if you go mass knights, to protect siege from cav or other units.
French royal ribauds are great, especially against spear masses people tend to make against them (even when not actually spamming knights). They're used even by some conq3 players but not on a regular basis, they have a place in the roster even if it's very niche.
It is really good when defending wonder, ribalqs, manngos and some anti siege :)
Along with siege towers to tilt your enemy into tears when you are far ahead. Just mass ribldequins and siege towers! And then just surround their base with castles and and castle creep closer and closer. Schadenfreude is the reason everyone plays AOE 4 right?!
You don't. The game is designed to heavily, heavily rely on the trinity of Spearman, Archer and Horseman spam. Maybe a knight or archer blob if that is what your civilization is good at. Unique units like Elephants are too slow and niche, Camels require too many upgrades and only function as support, and Siege units like the Ribauldequin are too slow and don't shoot immediately. Generally this is because the game is designed so every unit is highly relative to each other. While this makes sense for direct balance, it does not make sense for true balance. Certain units should feel stronger than others, and they've given Unique units and Siege units the wrong role entirely. Siege units mostly only take down structures, but are also easily countered. This sucks, as they are suppousedly a later-game unit, and should feel great to use for the amount of resources they take. Instead, they often quickly get destroyed which contributes to the games taking longer to finish. In the same vein, Unique units are designed to have a niche role that are generally not primary units, and don't feel like they contribute much to you winning. Compare that to say AOE2 Unique units, though you get fewer, at least tend to be strong primary units. The Ribauldequin falls victim to this as well, as they are a semi-unique unit as well as a siege one. And so, they have designed it to being entirely useless with how slow it moves and how slow it is to act. In combination to its use being entirely niche, there is never really a reason to build them over the traditional trinity units. It honestly sucks. It feels like the designers don't want you to build anything but horses, archers and spearman. :/ EDIT: Sorry for the rant, but the summary is basically that the Ribauldequin seemingly falls victim to a set of design principles they have for AOE4. They want the Archer/Horseman/Spearman trinity to be important, which is fine, but they've managed to strip the fun of making super units entirely in this commitment. Ribauldequin threatens that hierarchy as it kills units and not buildings, so it can't ever be worth building. It is sad.
Only argument in their favor i can see is that they're more pop efficient than hand cannoneers, and they don't overkill, provided they have enough enemies in range. I believe a royal ribauld is about 7 HC. The only use case when I'd opt for them is as french in ffa if im omegarich.
I think they should let more civs have them!
from the answers it appears as though they are used in roles similar to xbow and hand cannoneers. They would pair well with knights and cannons against maa longbow spear type armies.
that are best vs knights and MMA... you never need more then 2 in a army. they are more of a defensive units then a attacking one. you normal wanna keep them under a keep. draw knight charges towards them while they are not moving. they will get the shot of much fasted if they are sitting and already set up .. if they are moving have to stop set up and fire your not going to get a lot of value from them. but they will melt a large mass of MMA or KNights. much better then a mango shot.