“ | Upgrade of the Catapult. The Heavy Catapult has many more hit points and more range. | ” |
—Age of Empires description |
The Heavy Catapult is a slow and heavy siege weapon in Age of Empires used to eliminate buildings and defenses. Its attack features medium Area of Effect damage, regardless of whether the unit is a friend or foe.
Civilizations[]
The Heavy Catapult is an uncommon unit, and can only be trained by few civilizations.
Available | Unavailable |
---|---|
- x indicates that the civilization can fully upgrade their Heavy Catapults, i.e. gets Alchemy, Engineering, and Ballistics. Alchemy and Engineering were unavailable to the Assyrians before the Definitive Edition.
- + indicates that the civilization has at least one civilization bonus that benefits the combat strength of their Heavy Catapults.
Gameplay[]
The Heavy Catapult is the ultimate siege unit, costing an extremely expensive 1,800 food, 900 wood to upgrade from the Catapult. It doubles the hit points, adds +1 range, +1 pierce armor, 20% wider blast radius, and gains the ability to destroy trees. Before Return of Rome, it also required Siegecraft to be researched at the Market, a technology which otherwise provides no benefits for siege engines.
A major reason to invest the considerable resources to field Heavy Catapults is to get an edge with range. Normally they have the longest reach of anything in Age of Empires, but there are a few rare exceptions:
- Priests with Afterlife match their un-upgraded range. Egyptian Priests have an additional +3 bonus, so are the only units that can exceed the reach of a Heavy Catapult upgraded with Engineering.
- Catapults with Engineering slightly exceed the range of a Heavy Catapult without Engineering.
- Roman Helepolises with Engineering match the range of a Heavy Catapult without Engineering.*
- Choson Guard/Ballista Towers with Craftsmanship match the range of an un-upgraded Heavy Catapult.*
Another important use for Heavy Catapults over their forebears is their ability to destroy trees using the attack ground command. Trees are normally an impenetrable barrier to movement, only being slowly cleared away by Villagers. Heavy Catapults present the option of cutting quickly through wood lines to create new passages into enemy territory. In the original game, this ability was shared with the Juggernaut, but since the Definitive Edition it is unique to the Heavy Catapult.
Heavy Catapults provide a massive durability upgrade. In Return of Rome, there is no Archery Range unit that can destroy them with fewer than 38 shots (30 for Hittites), so they require a major concerted effort to bring down. Their enormous blast radius also makes their projectiles difficult to escape.
Otherwise, Heavy Catapults share the same traits as Catapults:
- Good damage versus towers (22), extreme damage versus other buildings (40).
- Projectiles have a wide blast radius that can devastate tightly-packed groups of units or clusters of buildings.
- Inflicts full damage on the player's own or allied troops, making it unwise to use for supporting a melee assault.
- Can continually bombard a tile with the attack ground command.
- Slow projectiles can be dodged by enemy micro-management, but the Heavy Catapult anticipates enemy movement trajectory at time-of-firing when upgraded with Ballistics.
- Unable to fire on nearby targets, making them extremely vulnerable to melee attacks, particularly cavalry rushes.
- Extremely slow-moving, compounding the vulnerability to melee troops.
- One of the few units in the game which requires no food to train, instead costing a large amount of wood and gold.
Further statistics[]
Unit strengths and weaknesses | |
---|---|
Strong vs. | Buildings, massed units |
Weak vs. | Cavalry |
Upgrades | |
Attack | Alchemy (+1) |
Range | Engineering (+2) |
Accuracy | Ballistics (hit moving targets) |
Civilization bonuses[]
- Hittites: Heavy Catapults have +50% hit points.
- Lac Viet: Heavy Catapults are trained 25% faster.
- Sumerians: Heavy Catapults fire 45% faster.
Team bonuses[]
- A team containing Assyrians: Heavy Catapults are produced 20% faster.
- Palmyrans: Researching technologies that benefit Heavy Catapults are 30% faster.
Changelog[]
Age of Empires[]
- Catapults can be upgraded to Heavy Catapults only if Siegecraft is researched.
- Heavy Catapults have 2 minimum range, 1.5 blast radius, 5 Rate of Fire, and 2.7 projectile speed, and 0 pierce armor.
- Heavy Catapults are visually identical to Catapults.
Definitive Edition[]
- Heavy Catapults have 3 minimum range, 1.2 blast radius, 5.375 Rate of Fire, and 3 projectile speed.
Return of Rome[]
- Researching Siegecraft is no longer required to upgrade Catapults to Heavy Catapults.
- Heavy Catapults receive a unique model to visually differentiate them from Catapults.
- Upon release, Heavy Catapults had 2 blast radius and 2.49 projectile speed. With hotfix 85208, they have 3.49 projectile speed. With update 87863, they have 1.2 blast radius again.
- Team bonuses added:
- Assyrians: Heavy Catapults are produced and upgraded 20% faster.
- Palmyrans: Technologies benefiting Heavy Catapults are researched 30% faster.
- With update 93001, Heavy Catapults have 1.5 blast radius and 5 pierce armor.
- With update 99311, Heavy Catapult melee armor reduced from 0 to -2.
History[]
The heavy catapult was a powerful siege weapon, representing the greatest advance in siege weaponry during ancient times. It was employed against fortifications and on the battlefield. It broke down fortification walls, allowing attackers to break in. On the battlefield, smaller missiles could be fired in a shower against dense formations of soldiers to cause casualties and disrupt morale at long range. Enemy armies that could be softened and shaken before the hand-to-hand clash of infantry were at a decided disadvantage.
Gallery[]
Video[]
Archery Range |
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Units in Age of Empires | |
---|---|
Civilian | Villager · Trade Cart |
Other | Priest · Slinger · Artifact |
Civilian ship | Fishing Boat · Fishing Ship Trade Boat · Merchant Ship Light Transport · Heavy Transport |
Infantry | Clubman · Axeman Short Swordsman · Broad Swordsman · Long Swordsmen · Legionary Hoplite · Phalangite · Centurion |
Archer | Bowman Improved Bowman · Composite Bowman Chariot Archer Horse Archer · Heavy Horse Archer Elephant Archer |
Cavalry | Scout Chariot · Scythe Chariot Cavalry · Heavy Cavalry · Cataphract War Elephant · Armored Elephant Camel Rider |
Siege | Stone Thrower · Catapult · Heavy Catapult Ballista · Helepolis |
War Ship | Scout Ship · War Galley · Trireme Catapult Trireme · Juggernaut Fire Galley |
Scenario Editor-only units | |
Chieftain · Donkey · Explorer · General · High Priest · Horse · Mercenary (removed) · Penguin · Pharaoh · Raft · War Chest |