Armor class: Condottiero

This article is about the armor class in Age of Empires II HD: Rise of the Rajas. For the units, see Condottiero.

The Condottiero armor class is an armor class introduced in patch 5.7 of Age of Empires II HD: Rise of the Rajas. Only the namesake unit has this armor class. Since update 153015, this is a "negative armor class", meaning all attack bonuses against this class are less than 0. It is used to reduce the reduce/negate the Infantry attacks done by units and buildings against the Condottiero.

All units that have an attack bonus against this class reduce the damage against the Condottiero, which is trainable by the Italians and their allies only.

History

As the Condottiero was supposed to be an anti-gunpowder unit, it was given +10 anti-Infantry, mainly to negate the Hand Cannoneer's +10 bonus damage against infantry. However this meant that the Condottiero also resisted other anti-infantry units like Cataphracts. To narrow the role of the Condottiero as anti-gunpowder, it was given its own specific armor class in patch 5.7. It now only resists gunpowder, and all non-gunpowder units who have an attack bonus against infantry receive their attack bonus against this armor class. However, sometimes the implementation is missed initially but fixed in later patches.

The way this armor class works is the attack value of the (non-gunpowder) unit's anti-Infantry attack is as stated if it is less than 10, otherwise capped to 10.

However, when new units with attack bonuses against infantry were being introduced, they were frequently missing the attack bonus against this armor class. With update 153015, the developers changed this armor class to a negative armor class, with the attack bonuses (actually penalty) present only for those units which are meant to negate the anti-infantry attack.

Units with attack penalties

The following units have an attack penalty against the Condottiero armor class. They are sorted descending by the amount of bonus damage they deal against the infantry armor class.

-10 bonus attack

• Hand Cannoneer

-9 bonus attack

• Grenadier (Jurchens only)

-2 bonus attack

• Organ Gun - Elite Organ Gun (Portuguese only)

Technologies

The following technologies give the following units and buildings an attack penalty against the Condottiero armor class:

• Citadels (Persians only)
  • -3 bonus attack
    • Castle (secondary projectiles only)

• Thunderclap Bombs (Jurchens only)
  • -3 bonus attack
    • Grenadier - three additional explosions

Bugs

In all the aforementioned cases, the positive attack bonus against the infantry armor class is compensated by the negative attack bonus against the Condottiero armor class. However, there are some notable exceptions.

• Burgundians: The Hand Cannoneer has increased +25% attack against the infantry armor class, but not against this armor class. As such, it deals +3 attack bonus against Hand Cannoneers.
• Persians: The primary projectiles of the Castle with Citadels deal +3 attack bonus against infantry, but not -3 against this armor class. As such, it deals +3 attack bonus against Hand Cannoneers.