Hunters, what's the point?

After playing ffh for a long time, with MANY games played, I must say hunters and rangers are easily the most pointless thing ever for me, heres why.

By the time you research the hunting tech (unless you beeline it) most of the animals in the world are gone already, and animals themselves suck for any and all fighting.
There are VERY few animal units that are actually useful, wherewolves being pretty much the only thing worth capturing, and even then they are only controlled by one civ.

So if animals are near useless, what about the fighting skills of the hunter? At the same cost as an axeman, the hunter offers the same strength of 4, 25% against animals (almost useless) and -20% attacking cities, and also they have 2 movement points. However, axemen, with the same cost while only having 1 movement point get a bonus on attacking cities 10%; but here's the big part, they are able to use weapons, which means right off the bat the axeman is strength 5, compared to the hunters 4. (which is a BIIIIG difference). Not only that but iron is just one more tech down the tree meaning they are strength 6.

So clearly hunters are meant for early game exploring, problem is by the time you get to them you could have easily gotten cartography and just traded maps with other civs.

As of now hunters are EXTREMELY situational and near useless in my case. Tell me if im wrong?

You're wrong.

Seriously, they're worthwhile in many situations. The bonus against animals is 50%, and it works against beasts too. They make it a lot easier to get the Grand Menagerie, they are better against Hill Giants, they can carry birds to scout, and they have different promotion options.

And if you don't have copper, then the axeman becomes the niche unit -- only better for attacking cities.

And if you don't have copper, then the axeman becomes the niche unit -- only better for attacking cities.

Click to expand...

Which is distressingly common. Copper has a 1/60 chance to appear on tiles that are even allowed to contain copper, which excludes all squares that start with any kind of feature (floodplain, forest, jungle).

@hiphopin

do you want elite-shadows and beastmasters with marksman, here comes your useless
hunters and are waiting for upgrade

One word sums up why hunters appear in every game I play: Hawks.
I feel blind if I don't have a good squadron to give me the low down.
They are also quite good at the occasional take down, especially once you start upgrading them.

I would disagree about hunters being uselless. In fact, I would really like to have them in my army early on, but, I do agree that it is costly to research Hunting, and by the way you do, there are no more animals in the world. In addition, subdue animal is enabled by animal husbandry, so, if you wish to capture animals, you have to research both. I found to be extremelly difficult to do so in time, so that you can capture any useful animals.

However, if you keep in mind that the benefits given from captured animals are a great city boost, I would say it is fair that only hunting-focused players should be able to make it, in order to copensate for the skipping of the other technologies(crafting/agriculture/mining/calendar/education) early on.

And, by the way, hawks are extremelly useful if you do not have metamagic Adepts.

If I'm going to capture animals in a game, I go straight for Animal Husbandry. By the time I have it, I have one or two scouts waiting for the promotion. depending on how many civs I have in the game, there are plenty of animals to capture by this point.

I have had scouts with Combat V, Subdue Animal, Woodsman I and Guerilla I all before I got hunting.

I will quite often get Hunting by this time, just so I can upgrade this powerful unit. It then goes out hunting Elephants and the few Giant Spiders and Bears remaining on the map.

As has been mentioned after that, they are still useful long after animals are gone. Their two movement combined with Mobility (they can get I & II) and Hawks makes them THE recon unit in the game.

As far as werewolves go, you can capture them fron the civ that builds them with beastmasters.

So you tell me if your wrong.

If animals are gone by the time you get hunting

hawks.

hunters are incredibly awesome.

Aside from that, I once destroyed an empire with a lone hunter. Ok, not really an empire, as they only had one city. But do did I when I made him.

HE trained against various animals and barbarians around my area, and when I stumbled into the sheiam and couldn't spare troops, he went in alone, making a small army of animals along the way. And over the course of about20-30 turns, I gradually wore down and took the city. The animals were near useless, but they helped as defence to prevent counterattacks.

Plus Hunters + Rangers (Recon Units) are the only land unit type that do not have a specific promotion against them.

I only build hunters because I want to upgrade well promoted units. Unless I have av holy city for some real carnage.

I only build hunters because I want to upgrade well promoted units. Unless I have av holy city for some real carnage.

I just realized I completely forgot Assassins. Those super hunters upgrade really nicely to super assassins.

Hunters are awesome in Orbi modmod, in fact they can be some of the most powerful units in the early game. You can capture animals and adopt them as pets for bonuses, Animals are around longer, and animals create explorable dens. People who complain about these things need to look into modmods like orbi because the game is finished! Kael and the team aren't going to be making changes unless something really, really moves them. A complaint about hunters isn't likely to do that. So go to the modmods section and find what you are looking for!

Bear harvesting means no need to build monuments in your recent expansion cities! A Nature II Mage gives your rangers strength 8 with no resources, giving you a very powerful, mobile midfield unit for a smaller tech cost than the comparable Champion.

There are several ways to make best use of the strengths of recon units. FoL religion has tech synergy and units on the same line. Raiders trait makes the best of recon mobility. The mobile nature can make siege units a little clunky, so I often use Mobility/Body/Chaos/Death or Air or Fire promoted Mages as city busters.

i think it would be a good idea to let hunting enable animal capturing.
i usually research hunting only if i go for FoL, it is quite expensive.
hawks are indeed awesome but i prefer all of the basic techs first.

Move 4 is enough of a reason for Hunters for me. Once I research Horseback Riding, all of my Melee units start getting move +1 as their first promotion and my hunters start turning into crazy 4 move powerhouses.

Sure, they're not going to be taking cities by themselves (at least not often), but they're great as a flying reserve to zip around your empire taking down invading Barbarians so that you don't need a zillion warriors/axes in each city.

Also, Hawks are an amazing item transport team. If you grab Orthus's Axe and want it on a unit 30 tiles away, have the Axe wielding unit meet up with a hunter that carries a Hawk (not hard to do with 4 movement Hunters)

Hawks alone makes them worth it. Send them up a peak and their visibility is amazing.

Bear harvesting sounds fun, but by the time you get it setup, the enemy usually has more than archers defending their cities anyway. But yes, useful replacement for monuments if you can set it up early.

Svartalfar hunters have 5 strength on attack and 2 movement in forests. -20% strength is offset by combat 1, and believe me, being able to rush towards a city from any angle, attack and raze a city, and then rush back into the defensive safety of the forests... let's just say I killed human players with it before.

Ignore this... read next post.

I don't agree that Hunters and Rangers are useless, not my style however (prefer the Assassins). But I would like Animals to get a boost, here are my suggestions;

• Give Marksman promotion to wolves, and maybe an inate withdrawal.
• Give Lions some kinda boost on attack, maybe only on flat lands.
• Give Bears a defensive boost.
• Increase the strength of Gorillas by maybe 2.
• Elephants are ok, it's a nice reward that you can get the pretty awesome War Elephants from them.
• Tigers should have a Forest/Jungle attack bonus. Maybe +1 strength.

Something like that...