Viking Berserker

[PritomD]

Well, seeing how someone posted on how they liked that, I think I'll post here why the Berserk is my favorite unique unit:

Well, I love the Berserker...it looks awesome..his huge axe and beard..love that. His stats are max rock, make the Longbowman USEFUL! With these guys, you can dominate the middle ages totally, cause the only contender(to defend against it) is the rifleman I think. and you can get it right away Sure, it costs more, but it costs as much as the knight I think, according to my manual...but you can research chivalry after feudalism...but the berskers are better, so you dong really need to researrch chivalry at all then! also...the amphibious attack gets my attention. Just expressed my thoughts...post your agreemnets/disagreements/comments!

 

[Sirp]

The beserkers are great units, but only if you have sea access, and your enemies have a significant number of coastal cities. On land, the beserkers are less effective than immortals are in ancient times. (Think about it: immortals have double the attack and defense of horsemen, and cost the same. Beserkers only have 1.5 times the attack and less defense of knights, and cost the same. Meanwhile the Beserker/MDI stats ratio is the same as immortals vs swords, but immortals cost the same as swords while MDIs are much cheaper than beserkers).

If you have access to sea though, they are great, being able to strike anywhere along the enemy coast. AIs are too dumb to attack galleys laden with beserks. Human opponents won't be so dumb, and will be able to defend themselves against beserks more effectively, although beserks are still a powerful unit.

-Sirp.

 

[Brewster]

I was wondering if it is possible to upgrade archer units to the Beserker? I read somewhere it is not possible, but since I haven't played them yet maybe someone here can tell me.

 

[Sirp]

Brewster: it is possible. <insert rant about how stupidly cheap upgrades are...>

-Sirp.

 

[Bamspeedy]

I think they weren't upgradable in the original PTW version, but that was quickly changed in a patch. So that may be where the confusion comes from.

 

[WalterJ]

They are an incredible unit when playing an archipielago, o continental map with a lot of coastal cities.

You can really surprise the AI and destroy their coastal cities, when they concentrate their forces in your border.

CLINT

 

[Thrawn]

Looks like I should leave Scandanavia alone then in my current archipelago map if Beserkers are so good at coastal attacks. At least for now.

 

[betazed]

IMHO, it is the amphibious trait that makes the berserker so unique. SO it is a great unit on archipelago maps. But on pangea maps, I will take the Persian immortals anyday. In fact on pangea maps, the high cost of the UU may actually be a disadvantage.

 

[Alkar]

Pangaea, lots of civs, Regent.

I have managed to keep the so-called "Expansionist Tech Jump" thanks to Berserks. No one had knights, and the best enemy defensive unit was the pikeman...

I'm taking on the world with the berserks, but the enemy is improving fastly their defensive units thanks to tech trading... fortunately, berserks lifecycle has been long enough to reach Chivalry in the nick of time... and no one has knights yet!

 

[Raggamuffin]

The Viking Berserker is IMHO too powerful and comes a bit too late so I've changed its stats to 5.2.1, decreased shield cost to 60 and moved it to Monotheism.

Wish I was good at graphics so I could replace that big ridiculous axe with a sword though...

 

[Raidne]

The berserk is good, though I don't use viking often. Having said that, one must feel sorry for civs like India, China, Japan... whose knight units are just minor upgrade from the ord knight (Samurai, defense +1 etc.). But the berserk is attack +2, which is the same as gurilla in the industrial era. I certainly do not understand why the axe does the same amount of damage as the automatic rifle does. To be fair, I think berserk should have an attack of 5 only. Personal opinion only.

 

[The Last Conformist]

Raidne: If individual hits on an unprotected human are concerned, I think my money is on a two-handed Viking-style battleaxe doing more damage than a Kalashnikov bullet. But I wouldn't assume the in-game attack ratings to be related directly to the destructive potential of real-world weapons - certainly a 16" naval gun has alot more than six times the striking power of an Ancient sword. How you can fail to love the Chinese Rider is beyond me.