Jaguar Prowl Knight

This article is about the Aztec unit in Age of Empires III. For the Aztec unique unit in Age of Empires II: The Conquerors, see Jaguar Warrior.

Jaguar Prowl Knight
Unit information
Introduced in	The WarChiefs
Type	Infantry Heavy infantry Melee infantry
Civilization	Aztecs
Age	Fortress Age
Abilities	Stealth mode
Training
Trained at	Nobles' Hut
Food	120
Coin	30
Training time	37 seconds
Statistics
Hit points	240
Resists	10% vs. Melee
Speed	4.50
Line of Sight	12
Population	1
XP train bounty	15
XP bounty	15
Melee attack
Damage	20
Multipliers	x3.0 vs. Heavy infantry x2.0 vs. Cavalry and Shock infantry
Rate of Fire	1.5
Siege attack
Damage	36
Range	6
Rate of Fire	3.0

“	Stealthy noble armed with an obsidian sword. Good against cavalry and heavy infantry.	”
—In-game description

The Jaguar Prowl Knight is a melee heavy infantry in Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs that is unique to the Aztecs and can be trained at the Nobles' Hut. It is the second most powerful melee unit of the Aztecs after the Skull Knight.

Overview

The Jaguar Prowl Knight is a very powerful and fast infantry unit of the Aztec civilization with a lot of hit points and attack and is very effective against heavy infantry and heavy cavalry units. They also have the stealth ability, which makes them slower (half speed) but completely invisible to most enemies.

These units are extremely powerful. Their largest weakness is artillery, which Coyote Runners should take care of. They have multipliers against all melee units, making them extremely good as meat shields against cavalry, as well as melee infantry such as Samurai. Grenadiers are very vulnerable in melee (due to heavy infantry classification) but a strong counter at range. Skirmisher units are extremely dangerous if they attack at range, but will fall if they get too close.

Jaguar Prowl Knights make an excellent counter to Heavy Infantry focused armies, and a decent counter to Cavalry focused armies. Melee infantry is very dangerous to Aztec armies, due to their multipliers against both Eagle Runner Knights and Coyote Runners, making Jaguar Prowl Knights an important unit vs civilizations that focus on melee units, such as Spanish Rodeleros. When exclusively against melee cavalry of all types, Eagle Runners, Puma Spearmen, or Skull Knights are superior in damage, but Jaguar Prowl Knights have extremely high hit points and take only a single population space, making them very good at blocking units. Utilizing stealth can also enable them to catch out Ranged Cavalry, which often have low hitpoints and fall very fast to Jaguar Prowl Knights.

It can be thought of as a Halberdier/ Skirmisher hybrid.

The Jaguar Prowl Knight is one of the Aztec civilization's knight units; as such, it is trained at the Nobles' Hut along with the Arrow Knight and the Eagle Runner Knight.

Strategies

• Units and structures that can see invisible units are hard counters for Jaguar Prowl Knights, as they allow enemy units to attack them, especially artillery and ranged infantry. Also, most of the strategies are based on stealth.
  • To reduce this impact, place a few Jaguar Prowl Knights or Coyote Runners on stealth (the latter with the Silent Strike Card sent) at different points far from the army, to know where they are in the enemy formations.
  • Use some Coyote Runners to kill one of them, as they are fast enough to reach them and have good damage.
  • For buildings, use Arrow Knights and/or Puma Spearmen; both have excellent siege damage options.
• A few Jaguar Prowl Knights can be used as sentinels near the enemy’s colony to know what they are doing.
  • Try to keep a short distance between each one’s LOS to create a view chain.
  • Remember that Explorers, Warchiefs, Spies and Ninjas can reveal units stealth units when they are near them. The same occurs with Town Centers.
  • Use the deny effect to know how much LOS the enemy has, by simply seeing where the unit starts to enter stealth.
• The stealth Jaguar army should march in front.
  • Move a few of them in the flanks of the big army, to ambush unprotected enemy artillery or ranged units.
    • Beware of units that are protecting, especially those ones that can reveal stealth.
• Jaguar Prowl Knights don't lose their unit collision on stealth, and in big formations, enemy players can note their presence more easily. Also, they can receive damage from area attacks.
• In an Arrow Knight or Macehualtin composition, it is recommended to maintain the Jaguar Prowl Knight’s stealth and place them around the ranged units, waiting for enemy melee infantry or melee cavalry attack.
  • With Eagle Runner Knights, Skull Knights, or Coyote Runners, the strategy can be used to attract and ambush enemy artillery or ranged infantry when they are chasing the Eagle Runner Knight, Skull Knight or Coyote Runner Army when it retreats.
    • Works better with Eagle Runner Knights as they allow the player to hit & run, becoming more attractive to chase by enemy infantry or cavalry.
• Despite having multipliers against cavalry and light infantry, is recommended to use Eagle Runner Knight or Puma Spearman to deal with those, especially the latter, which has a better speed and damage against all cavalry and light infantry units, and 10% resistance against range damage, letting Jaguar Prowl Knights deal with heavy infantry with more hit points.
• When protecting, activate “In cover” formation on Jaguar Prowl Knights to receive half damage from both ranged and artillery attacks.
  • Use Macehualtins and Eagle Runner Knights to support them against heavy infantry and melee cavalry, because in this formation mode they lose half damage.
• Enemy units with only the infantry tag are difficult to kill, as they don’t receive bonus damage from Jaguar Prowl Knight’s attacks.

Upgrades

Age	Upgrade	Cost	Effect
	Champion Jaguar Prowl Knights	400 wood, 200 coin	Upgrades Jaguar Prowl Knights to Champion (+25% hit points and attack)
	Legendary Jaguar Prowl Knights	1,500 wood, 1,500 coin	Upgrades Jaguar Prowl Knights to Legendary (+50% hit points and attack); requires Champion Jaguar Prowl Knights

Further statistics

As Jaguar Prowl Knights are unique to the Aztecs, only technologies that they have access to are shown in the following table:

Unit strengths and weaknesses
Strong vs.	Infantry, cavalry, buildings
Weak vs.	Skirmishers, archers, artillery
Improvements
Hit points	Cree Tanning (+5%) Maya Cotton Armor (+20%) Navajo Weaving (+5%)
Attack	Carib Kasiri Beer (+10%) Mapuche Tactics (+50% siege attack) Zapotec Cult of the Dead (+20%) Yoga (+5%) Master Lessons (+10%)
Speed	Incan Road-building (+20%) Apache Endurance (+5%)
Creation speed	Incan Chasquis Messengers (-25%)
Other	Aztec Scouting Party (ships 3 Jaguar Prowl Knights) Aztec Raiding Party (ships 6 Jaguar Prowl Knights) Aztec War Party (ships 12 Jaguar Prowl Knights) Meritocracy (-20% upgrade cost)

Home City Cards

As Jaguar Prowl Knights are unique to the Aztecs, only their cards and other civilizations' TEAM cards are shown in the following tables:

Click for a list of Home City Cards related to the Jaguar Prowl Knight

Green: TEAM Shipment that is sent to each player in a team Purple: Shipment that can be sent an INFINITE number of times Aztecs Card Description Age HC level 5 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 5 Jaguar Prowl Knights 1 8 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 8 Jaguar Prowl Knights 1 6 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 6 Jaguar Prowl Knights 10 9 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 9 Jaguar Prowl Knights 10 11 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 11 Jaguar Prowl Knights 25 9 Jaguar Prowl Knights Ships 9 Jaguar Prowl Knights 40 Scorched Earth Arrow Knights, Eagle Runner Knights, and Jaguar Prowl Knights get +50% siege attack 10 Knight Hitpoints Arrow Knights, Eagle Runner Knights, Jaguar Prowl Knights, and Skull Knights get +15% hit points 10 Knight Attack Arrow Knights, Eagle Runner Knights, Jaguar Prowl Knights, and Skull Knights get +15% attack 10 Knight Combat Arrow Knights, Eagle Runner Knights, Jaguar Prowl Knights, and Skull Knights get +15% hit points and attack 25 Fencing School Infantry train time -40% 10 Great Temple of Quetzalcoatl Support Ships 18 Jaguar Prowl Knights and Jaguar Prowl Knights get +25% attack; costs 2,000 coin 25 Dutch Card Description Age HC level TEAM Infantry Hitpoints Infantry get +15% hit points 10 Indians Card Description Age HC level TEAM Shivaji's Tactics All units get +5% hit points and attack 25 Iroquois Card Description Age HC level TEAM Scout Infantry Infantry get +8 LOS 10 Japanese Card Description Age HC level TEAM Cheaper Unit Upgrades Unit upgrades cost -20% 1 Russians Card Description Age HC level TEAM Dueling School Infantry train time -25%; banner army train time -12% 25 Spanish Card Description Age HC level TEAM Hand Infantry Attack Melee infantry get +15% attack 10 TEAM Inquisition All units get +10 LOS 10

Changelog

The WarChiefs

• Jaguar Prowl Knights have 230 hit points and 18 melee attack.

Definitive Edition

• Jaguar Prowl Knights now have 240 hit points and 20 melee attack.

Trivia

• The Jaguar Prowl Knight has the same siege damage (36) as the Arrow Knight.
• The Jaguar Prowl Knight uses an obsidian sword known by the Aztecs as Macahuitl.

History

“

Aztec warriors who had captured at least four enemy soldiers became eligible for the ranks of the eagle runner knights or the jaguar prowl knights. Presumably this emphasis on capturing enemies was to collect a pool of captives for sacrifice, but the Aztecs were well-known for dealing death in battle, killing with single strokes of their obsidian swords or hurling atlatl-driven flights of barbed spears. Warriors who caused confusion or disorder in the ranks were beaten on the spot and sometimes killed. The dress of jaguar prowl knights incorporated bright colors and spots to evoke the imagery of a jaguar. The jaguar was a symbol of the night, a prowler and a predator, an appropriate model for an elite warrior. Jaguar prowl knights are usually depicted carrying shields and obsidian swords.

”

Gallery

An in-game Jaguar Prowl Knight

An in-game Champion/Legendary Jaguar Prowl Knight

The Jaguar Prow Knight from the in-game history section

Jaguar Prowl Knight model

Champion/ Legendary Jaguar Prowl Knight model

Jaguar Prowl Knight concept art

Add a photo to this gallery