In Age of Empires IV, units represent all the economic, military, and support personnel to which a civilization has access. Civilizations begin the game with only a small amount of units and must build up their economy and military by creating additional units.
Unit classifications[]
Each unit in Age of Empires IV can typically be placed under one classification depending on its primary role. Some units, such as the Warrior Monk, may fit under multiple classifications. Additionally, units have several different unit types which define how they interact with other units, technologies or game conditions. The following are some of the primary unit classifications:
- Workers: Workers or civilians are primarily responsible for gathering resources
- Infantry units fight on foot. They can be further classified as:
- Cavalry units fight while mounted. They can be further classified as:
- Siege engines: Slow-moving units good against buildings, grouped units, or other roles.
- Religious units: collects Relics, captures Sacred Sites, heals allied units, and converts enemy units.
- Military Ship: Naval units used to contest control of the water.
Hero units[]
Various civilizations have some units of which only one can exist at a time. These are often called hero units and are also usually characterized by significantly higher health, high attack, and abilities. In addition to being hero units, they also can be classified according to one of the above classifications.
Unit availability[]
Like in other titles, Age of Empires IV has both generic units and unique units. Generic units are shared by most civilizations and almost always have the same statistics across civilizations. In some cases, otherwise generic units may have different names for different civilizations to give them more historical accuracy. All civilizations in Age of Empires IV have at least two unique units. These unique units may be variants of and replacements for generic units, performing the same function with modified statistics (such as the Longbowman) or an added Grenadier. There are also 'pseudo-unique' units, available to some, but not all civilizations.
Generic units[]
The list of generic units is as follows:
Economic[]
Villager - gathers resources, constructs and repairs buildings- Trader - trades with Trade Posts and allied Markets to generate gold or other resources
- Fishing Boat - collects Fish
- Transport Ship - transports land units across water bodies
- Trade Ship - trades with Trade Posts and allied Docks to generate gold or other resources
Land Military[]
- Spearman - anti-cavalry light melee infantry
- Man-at-Arms - general purpose heavy melee infantry
- Archer - low attack anti-light-infantry ranged infantry
- Crossbowman - anti-heavy ranged infantry
- Handcannoneer - high attack general purpose ranged infantry. Called 'Ashigaru Handcannoneer' for the Japanese.
- Scout - scout unit which cannot be upgraded
- Horseman - anti-ranged unit light melee cavalry
- Knight/Lancer - general purpose heavy melee cavalry. Called 'Knight' for European civilizations, and 'Lancer' otherwise.
- Battering Ram - Early short-range anti-building siege engine that can garrison infantry
- Siege Tower - Transport siege engine that can place infantry on top of Stone Walls
- Mangonel - Siege engine that deals area of effect damage at range. Strong against massed ranged units.
- Counterweight Trebuchet - long-ranged anti-building siege engine
- Springald - siege engine that counters melee infantry and deals pass-through damage
- Bombard - powerful anti-building gunpowder siege engine
Religious[]
There is no single, generic name for the standard religious unit. The name of each civilization's religious unit depends on that civilization's historical religion. The current generic names are 'Monk' for Christian and Buddhist civilizations, 'Imam' for Islamic civilizations, and 'Shaman' for the Mongols.
[]
Similar to religious units, naval units also do not have single, generic names for each ship across all civilizations. However, military ships are divided into four main 'generic' types for which almost ships sharing that type have the same statistics. The four main types are:
The following units are not considered unique, but are only available to a few civilizations:
- Culverin - Bombard variant with lower damage but faster fire rate
- Ribauldequin - Powerful gunpowder siege strong against massed melee units
Unique units[]
Every civilization in Age of Empires IV has at least one unique unit. The Holy Roman Empire have the fewest at two, while the Japanese have the most at 13. Unique units in Age of Empires IV which replace regular units, like how the Ghazi Raider replaces the Horseman for the Delhi Sultanate, may have slightly different statistics and roles, and usually have abilities to better differentiate them from the regular units.
Many unique units available to a base civilization are available to its variant civilization. These units are still considered unique, since variant civilizations can be considered a 'subset' of the main civilization.
There are some units that may seem unique due to their unique name, appearance, and availability to one or a small number of civilizations, but have identical statistics and function to their regular counterparts in other civilizations. These include:
- Imam (only available to the Abbasid Dynasty before the Season Three Update, now also available to the Ayyubids, Malians, and Ottomans)
- Shaman (only available to the Mongols)
- The Handcannoneer of the Japanese is named Ashigaru Handcannoneer.
- Ships of the same type - Eg: archer ship flavors such as Junk for the Chinese, Light Junk for the Mongols, Lodya Galley for the Rus, etc.
- The War Cog, the springald ship of the French, has slightly different stats and a different name, which may place it as a unique unit, but is typically just considered an improved springald ship, since it does not have "special abilities". Moreover, it does not even have a different unit model from other Hulks.
Some non-unique units have unique upgrades or unique versions available only to a single civilization:
- Royal Ribauldequins and Royal Culverins are available only to the French through the College of Artillery.
- Clocktower versions of siege engines are available only to the Chinese through the Astronomical Clocktower.
The Mongols and Byzantines have access to other civilizations' unique units through the Khaganate Palace or Mercenary House respectively. The available units are still considered unique to their original civilizations since they are not available by default to the Mongols or Byzantines. The Huihui Pao is a special case insofar as it is available to both of these civilizations in special cases (through unique landmarks), making it a unique unit not available by default to any one particular civilization. It was originally only available to the Mongols and uses Mongol voice lines in both cases, which may favor it more as a Mongol unique unit, but the Mongols have no method of reliably training it, unlike the Byzantines, and it only spawns randomly from the Khaganate Palace.
Unit attributes[]
Every unit in Age of Empires IV is defined by its template or 'blueprint'. These define the unit's cosmetic features (such as its name, dialogue lines, model, animations, and icon) and its gameplay elements (such as unit statistics and types). The attributes are defined separately for each civilization for each unit, usually derived from a common template. This allows each civilization's units to have different unit models, dialogue lines, statistics, and other features.
The primary gameplay statistics that define a unit are its cost, training time, Line of Sight, hit points, speed, armor, and attacks. Many of these statistics can be upgraded with various technologies. Units may also have special abilities or enhancements that can change their behavior or statistics. Almost all units cost a combination of food, wood, and gold to create, with most units costing two of the three resources and some units costing all three or just one. Units are created almost exclusively one-at-a-time at various buildings, and their training time is typically somewhat proportional to their cost. That is, the more expensive a unit is, the longer it takes to train. Various civilization bonuses can circumvent these general rules, such as the Mongols being able to train units two-at-a-time at the cost of additional stone, or the Byzantines using the unique Olive Oil resource to create units in larger groups. Each unit has one or more attacks, and these attacks are defined separately from the units themselves. They include attributes such as range, damage, and Area of Effect.
List of units[]
Torch thrower class[]
10
13
17
21Units classified as torch throwers automatically inherit the basic torch attack (shown on the right). Most melee infantry and cavalry units are classified as torch throwers. Notable exceptions are:
- Fire Lancer - torch thrower, but very high torch attack
- War Elephant, Tower Elephant - not torch throwers
- Gilded units - torch thrower, but +8 torch attack at all stages
- Warrior Monk - not classified as melee, but inherits the basic torch attack