The Katapeltes is an Atlantean counter-cavalry unit available in the Classical Age.
God Bonuses and Upgrades[]
Specific[]
- Weightless Mace (Oceanus): Increases hack damage by 15% and speed by 10%.
General[]
Oranos increases movement speed by 10%.
- Medium Infantry, Heavy Infantry and Champion Infantry all increase LOS by 1 and attack by 10%, and increase HP by 10%, 15% and 20% respectively.
- Levy Counter Units and Conscript Counter Units decrease training time by 20%.
- Copper Weapons, Bronze Weapons and Iron Weapons increase attack by 10%.
- Copper Mail, Bronze Mail and Iron Mail decrease hack vulnerability by 10%.
- Copper Shields, Bronze Shields and Iron Shields decrease pierce vulnerability by 10%.
- Heart of the Titans (Prometheus): costs 20% less food and gold to upgrade into Katapeltes Hero.
- Volcanic Forge (Leto): reduces pierce vulnerability by 10%.
Strategy[]
The Katapeltes is a dedicated counter-cavalry unit and will destroy cavalry easily and when in groups they are able to handle even War Elephants. They are decent against siege weapons as well. However, they are weak against everything else, especially archers. This makes their usefulness somewhat dubious.
Murmillo can easily handle most of their combat roles. They are less effective against cavalry and have slightly lower HP but are more versatile as they have almost double the base attack of a Katapeltes and are slightly cheaper. As such Katapeltes are generally the inferior choice unless the opponent is massing cavalry or War Elephants.
Changelog[]
The Titans[]
- Originally, the Katapeltes has 120 hit points. With patch 1.02, it has 115 hit points.
History[]
The Katapeltes is very effective against cavalry, but is expensive and weak against all other units.
While the mace doesn't at first appear to be a weapon suited to fighting cavalry, used with precision, the powerful strikes can smash through armor to crush the legs of horses and knees or riders. Only the heaviest armor could turn aside the attacks of the Katapeltes - the shield smasher.
Katapeltes Hero[]
Like all Atlantean human units, a Katapeltes can be converted into a Hero at any time, provided the player has sufficient resources.
Upgrades[]
Specific[]
- Weightless Mace (Oceanus): Increases hack damage by 15% and speed by 10%.
General[]
Oranos increases movement speed by 10%.
- Copper Weapons, Bronze Weapons and Iron Weapons increase attack by 10%.
- Copper Mail, Bronze Mail and Iron Mail decrease hack vulnerability by 10%.
- Copper Shields, Bronze Shields and Iron Shields decrease pierce vulnerability by 10%.
- Heroic Renewal (Hyperion) regenerates 1.5 HP/second (2.5 in the Extended Edition).
- Volcanic Forge (Leto): reduces pierce vulnerability by 15%.
Trivia[]
- The name "Katapeltes" is Greek, meaning Shieldbreaker. This, along with their general design, suggests they might at one point have been intended to be an Atlantean counter-infantry unit, instead of being counter-cavalry.
- "Katapeltes" is also the etymological root of "Catapult".
- The Katapeltes are one of several anti-cavalry units in the series to use a club, the others being the Maceman, the Mapuche Ironwood Clubman, the Nootka Clubman, the Nootka War Chief, and the Yamabushi from Age of Empires III.