“Why Do Professionals Prefer Other Cavalry Civilizations Instead of Slavs?”
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Lately, there have been very few instances of professional gamers selecting Slavs as their preferred civilization.
This is rather ironic, as Slavs were featured in “The Forgotten” DLC, which was meant to highlight lesser-known factions.
I am curious as to why expert players seem to prefer using cavalry-focused factions like Franks, Magyars, and Bulgarians instead of Slavs.
Even though Slavs are equally competent in scenarios where Franks excel, they are often overlooked.
What is it about Slavs’ technology tree that makes them less appealing?
So in 2017/2018, pros played Slavs a ton.
Then DE came out, and their farmer bonus was nerfed from 15% to 10%.
Coupled with this was some bad pathing at the start of DE that saw a decrease in knight play, and that made pros shift heavily away from picking Slavs.
Since then they have received a buff to boyar, and a new UT.
But in all honesty why they aren’t seen more is that Poles were released.
Poles are essentially Slavs except that their farmer bonus is better (its frontloaded) they have the stone->gold bonus, and their tech tree is arguably much better, with access to bracer arbs and bbc/HC and Obuch.
Not to mention the Polish Privileges
So basically the meta left them behind and then they got replaced by a dlc civ
slavs are just not that good, with new patch they should be much more viable though.
Slavs power kicks in too late for a cavalry civ, while you have good eco, your castle age knights are generic, while you have Franks, Magyars and Berbers with active cavalry bonuses of which Franks and Magyars already get bonuses in the feudal age.
The lack of gunpowder makes certain matchups awkward, and infantry/siege is really a late game thing anyway, which many games in the open map focused pro scenes we don’t get to.
Lastly, boyar is a good unit, but suffers from a similar trade off as bulgarians, weaker against ranged units, which is something you generally don’t want when facing archers.
Both slavs and Bulgarians lack paladin, which sucks, as otherwise you could go with paladin against archer civs and UU against knights.
While their eco-bonus is lategamewise one of the best in the game, things can get tricky against civs with a potent open tech tree.
If a civ can “mirror” their earlier cav play and you are facing BBC, halberdier and HC, your options in 1v1 are not that easy.
Sure, onagers flatten HC, but in 1v1 they are still a rare play.
That being said, hitting the timing with druzhina champs can be a very satisfying play against many civs which are “higher rated”.
They are good as a pocket in team games, particularly on closed maps.
In games where it goes late and there’s trade the boyar can be a good switch especially with the cheaper castles.
If you can get to 3-4 castle elite boyar production any non-heavy camel civ will have a bad time.
Lack of early game bonus and they basically play a little predictable.
Slavs eco bonus kicks in much later and not necessarly better.
Current meta is all about getting power spike as early as possible
Glad that they aren’t getting picked, they absolutely need the Indians -> Hindustanis treatment.
Can’t believe they lasted this long without atleast a basic renaming.
Boyars are slow and produced out of castles making them harder to mass and slower to initially field
Franks are 1 minute faster in early game
Slavs hover around the 50 percent mark at 2k+.
But some other cav civs are a bit better.
That said data suggests slavs are underrated atm and that slavs outpreform bulgarians quite significantly.
Even top player pick what is deemed to be good, not always whats best.
Why play slavs when you can play poles?
Their strengths are great siege, great monks, great infantry, a great farming bonus..a pretty decent UU, cheaper castles , long term.
Easy pop space on military buildings that you’ll want anyway…They don’t lack strengths, they just lack the showy bonuses of other more popular civs.
All the tools you need are there to have a successful game.
I think we’re looking at this wrong here..we’re looking at civs and going “but they’re THIS civ, so why are we playing it?” rather than..”what does this civ bring to the table ?” There’s nothing about their tech tree that’s particularly bad..yes they have mediocre archers and for whatever reason they are confused about the newfangled gadget called a bombard cannon.
But other civs do as well, and they aren’t called boring..It’s really just the Slavs that get the rep.
They really do bring a fair bit to the table.
Maybe it’s better to play it safe when money’s at stake in tourneys..but..I feel like we need to be playing civs for what they are rather than randoming into Slavs and thinking..”damn..they aren’t the Franks.” and just saying this civ is boring.
I’m not honestly sure what we want here, should all the Slav units start busting out of the stables and barracks wearing gaudy neon armor with sequins singing “I’m a rhinestone cowboy”?
Bigger issue is what is so desirable about Slavs tree.
What can they do that other civs can’t do better?
For example, Franks have faster food bonuses to set up eco better, and bigger knights.
Long long term Slav farming is neat, but getting an early start and stomping your opponent before something like that kicks in is usually more effective.
Slavs are okay, but they’re kind of lacking in actual strengths.
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