| “ | Stronger than Heavy Camel. Excels at killing other mounted units. | ” |
| —Age of Empires II description | ||
The Imperial Camel Rider (called Imperial Camel before the Definitive Edition) is the second unique unit of the Hindustanis in Age of Empires II: The Forgotten. It can be trained at the Stable once the Imperial Age is reached. It is an anti-cavalry unit.
Unlike most unique units, Imperial Camel Riders do not have an Elite version, as they are already a final unique upgrade.
Tactics[]
Imperial Camel Riders are one of the most versatile and powerful cavalry units in the game due to their variety of uses in the battlefield, and given the number of advantages they have compared to ordinary cavalry. Besides having an attack bonus against other cavalry units, they have decent attack, high hit points, fast speed, are cheaper than Knights, and have average armor. Due to the Hindustani team bonus ( +2 attack vs standard buildings) and Hindustani bonus of +25% faster attack, they are fairly good for raiding enemy Towns. They can easily kill Paladins in one on one combat and can also defeat War Elephants in small groups.
As the Hindustanis lack any unit from the Knight line, Camel Riders are a vital part of their armies for a fast, yet fairly resilient unit. They can be used as a shield for weaker units, while still being able to slaughter cavalry and some archers. However, they are not as effective against Cataphracts, whose special resistance negates most of the bonus damage from the Camel Riders. Although they have an attack bonus against buildings, their low pierce armor means they should not deal against any of defensive structures on their own.
The Imperial Camel Rider is a well-rounded unit, and is able to handle almost any unit, even infantry, but while it can defeat even Halberdiers one on one, it is not cost effective enough to send them against a group of any kind of pole armed infantry because they can deal heavy damage even without defeating the Camel Rider force.
As a side note, despite being available only to a single civilization and the Imperial Camel Rider upgrade being unique to the Hindustanis, the unit itself is treated as an ordinary member of the Camel Rider line by the game. Hence, unlike the Condottiero or Slinger, the Imperial Camel Rider takes no bonus damage from Samurai.
Further statistics[]
As Imperial Camel Riders are unique to the Hindustanis, only technologies that are available to them are shown in the following table:
| Unit strengths and weaknesses | |
|---|---|
| Strong vs. | Skirmishers, siege weapons, Cavalry Archers, cavalry |
| Weak vs. | Pikemen, Kamayuks, Teutonic Knights, Genoese Crossbowmen, Berserks, Cataphracts |
| Upgrades | |
| Hit points |  Bloodlines (+20)
|
| Attack |  Forging (+1) Iron Casting (+1) Blast Furnace (+2)
|
| Armor |  Scale Barding Armor (+1/+1) Chain Barding Armor (+1/+1) Plate Barding Armor (+1/+2)
|
| Speed |  Husbandry (+10%)
|
| Conversion defense |  Faith
|
| Creation speed |  Conscription (+33%)
|
Civilization bonuses[]
- Hindustanis: Imperial Camel Riders attack 25% faster.
Team bonuses[]
- A team containing Bulgarians: Researching cavalry armor and attack upgrades at the Blacksmith is 80% faster.
- A team containing Gurjaras: Imperial Camel Riders are created 25% faster.
- A team containing Hindustanis: Imperial Camel Riders have +2 attack against standard buildings.
- A team containing Huns: Imperial Camel Riders are created 20% faster. Researching Bloodlines and Husbandry is 20% faster.
- A team containing Lithuanians: Researching Faith is 20% faster.
- A team containing Teutons: Imperial Camel Riders are more resistant to conversion.
Changelog[]
The Forgotten[]
- The unit is named Imperial Camel, and has 9 attack and 4 Line of Sight.
- Imperial Camels are in an armor class along with ships, and take bonus damage from anti-ship/anti-camel attacks.
- The Indian civilization bonus gives Imperial Camels +1/+1 armor.
- The Indian team bonus gives Imperial Camels have +6 attack against buildings.
The African Kingdoms[]
- Imperial Camels reskinned.
- The ship armor class is removed from the Imperial Camels, and they receive an own armor class.
Rise of the Rajas[]
- With patch 5.8, the Indian civilization bonus removes +1 melee armor bonus and only gives +1 pierce armor.
Definitive Edition[]
- The unit is renamed to Imperial Camel Rider.
- With update 37650, the Indian team bonus gives Imperial Camel Riders have +6 attack against standard buildings instead, so that it is no longer negated by Masonry or Architecture. With update 42848, the bonus is reduced to +4.
- With update 42848, the Indian civilization bonus gives Imperial Camel Riders +2 pierce armor. Indians lose access to Plate Barding Armor.
Dynasties of India[]
- With update 61321, Imperial Camel Riders have 8 attack, 5 Line of Sight, and now attack 25% faster instead of having +2 pierce armor. Hindustanis regain access to Plate Barding Armor.
Trivia[]
- Camel Riders are one of two military units that do not make the usual military sound when created, the other being Trebuchets.
- The Imperial Camel Rider makes the same sound effects as the Camel Rider from Age of Empires.
- They used the same icon as the Heavy Camel Rider until patch 3.5.
- The original unit design for the Imperial Camel Rider (up until patch 3.5) was based on the beta The Age of Kings design for the Heavy Camel Rider.
- In Age of Empires II: The Forgotten Empires and Age of Empires II HD: The Forgotten, up to patch 3.5, the Imperial Camel Rider was a redesigned regular Heavy Camel Rider with a longer fabric covering and an attack animation somewhat similar to a Mameluke. The design was brought up to speed with the other expansion units in patch 3.6.
- The Imperial Camel Rider is one of the only three unique units that is an upgrade of a regular unit (the other ones being the Imperial Skirmisher and the Houfnice).
- The Imperial Camel Rider is one of only four unique units not taking bonus damage from the Samurai (the other ones being the Imperial Skirmisher, the Houfnice and the Camel Scout), due to being upgrades, the last one being an earlier version, of common units.
- The Imperial Camel Rider is one of only three unique unit that is initially trained at the Stable, the other ones being the Camel Scout and the Shrivamsha Rider. They are joined by the Tarkan when Marauders is researched.
- Gurjaras' Imperial Camel Riders placed at start of the game have the option of auto-scout.
- The Imperial Camel Rider is probably one of the most powerful cavalry units in team games, because it is highly durable and has bonus against other cavalry units, making it unbalanced before the removal of Plate Barding Armor. This was even more critically overpowered before patch 5.7, since they took less bonus damage from Camel Armor, and had more base armor (+1/+1) thanks to the civilization bonus, even though at that time the team bonus would be negated if Architecture had been researched.
- As of Dynasties of India, Hindustanis recover access to Plate Barding Armor, as well as gain a new civilization bonus which makes Camel Riders attack 25% faster, but with the team bonus reduced to +2 (and extended to the Scout Cavalry line).
Gallery[]
Video[]
IMPERIAL CAMEL RIDER vs EVERY UNIQUE UNIT (Total Resources) - AoE II- Definitive Edition
IMPERIAL CAMEL RIDER (Hindustanis) vs EVERY UNIQUE UNIT (Total Resources) - AoE II- DE
