Mercenaries

## Overview

A **Mercenary** is a special type of unit in *Age of Empires III: Wars of Liberty* that was introduced in the vanilla game and then improved and expanded in *The War Chiefs* and *The Asian Dynasties*. Mercenaries are units that only cost coin and represent a powerful variant of standard units.

Originally, mercenaries could only be sent from the Home City in different numbers. In the expansions the Saloon and Monastery were made available to the Europeans and Asians respectively. The player can train two random mercenary units at them.

In these buildings there are also Outlaws available to be trained, which cost much less and take more population instead. They work as a placeholder for mercenary units in National Age and they are standardized for each map. For example, the Renegado is available in Texas, but not in Borneo.

The Saloon is renamed as Tea House in Wars of Liberty.

Minor ally units sent from the Home City are also considered mercenaries, and as such are affected by the respective bonuses or technologies that affect mercenaries. Such as receiving additional damage from spies.

## Existing Mercenaries

In Wars of Liberty many new mercenary units were introduced alongside their counterparts in the Tea House and old mercenaries got a name change to better fit the new environment.

### AoE III, TWC and TAD

* Barbary Corsair: Fast-moving hand infantry from the Barbary Coast. (Based on the Footman)
* Black Rider: A hand armored Dragoon-like from Germany.
* Bosniak Lancer: Balkan Hussar-like. (Renamed *Stradiot*)
* Cairo Mamluk: Bold cavalry mercenary from Egypt. (Renamed *Mameluke*)
* Elmeti: Heavy cavalry from Italy. (Based on the Demi-Lancer)
* Fusilier: Swedish fast and frail heavy infantry with ranged bonuses.
* Hackapell: Finnish cavalry with low Hit Points but a huge attack. (Based on the Uhlan)
* Hessian: Swiss infantry with high range. (Based on the Skirmisher, renamed *Jaeger*)
* Iron Troop: Fast-firing archer from China, good against infantry.
* Jat Lancer: High attack and low hit points Indian heavy cavalry. (Based on the Demi-Lancer)
* Landsknecht: Archaic infantry mercenary from Bohemia. Good against cavalry. Has a splash attack. (not to be confused with the [Habsburgs' one).
* Lil' Bombard: Italian bombard. (Based on the Dardanelles Gun)
* Privateer: Mercenary warship with high resistance. (Based on the Caravel
* Redshank: Scottish Line Infantry. (Based on the Line Infantry, renamed *Highlander*)
* Swiss Pikeman: Powerful hand infantry from Switzerland. (Based on the Pikeman)
* Tartar: Chinese Cavalry Archer. (Based on the Cavalry Archer, renamed *Manchu*)
* Yojimbo: Heavly armored mounted archer from Japan.

### Newly added in WoL

* Alkar Lancer: Lancer cavalry from Croatia that does hand damage from range and is good at taking down artillery.
* Arnaut: Albanian heavy infantry mercenary. Carries a bayonet to beat shock units.
* Bashi Bazouk: Raiding infantry mercenary.
* Bargi: Raiding cavalry mercenary from Bengal that deals great damage against buildings.
* Black Brunswicker: Hand cavalry mercenary from Brunswick with a fearsome attack.
* Black Shot: Jamaican mercenary rifleman good at taking down cavalry at range.
* Blue Guard: Elite long-ranged grenadier from the Netherlands.
* Burgwache: Grenadier mercenary from Baden incredibly resistant to ranged attacks.
* Cantonist: Latvian heavy ranged infantry good in numbers.
* Fenrik: Ranged light infantry mercenary from Norway that will fight for your cause.
* Hausa: Heavy ranged infantry mercenary from Nigeria good at scouting surrounding areas.
* Herfylkingin: Heavy infantry mercenary from Iceland with a siege attack in both range and melee that can pierce every armor.
* Hongyipao: Powerful bombard of European design manufactured using Chinese techniques.
* Horse Jaeger: Mounted skirmisher mercenary from Livonia good against heavy infantry and light cavalry.
* Huai: Heavy ranged infantry mercenary from China with an area damage hand attack. Good against cavalry.
* Immortal: Latin American Manoeuvre cavalry mercenary, good against assault units.
* Kabardin: Manoeuvre cavalry mercenary, good against assault units.
* Mambi: Cuban cavalry mercenary with a fast rate of attack.
* Manillaman: Valiant Filipino mercenary armed with a rifle.
* Maxim Gun: Powerful automatic-fire weapon. Better against infantry than buildings.
* Japanese Ninja: Japanese assassin. Highly effective vs. mercs, explorers, and war chiefs.
* Patangpuluhan: Royal guard infantry of Yogyakarta with many hit points.
* Perjanik: Montenegrin bodyguard that makes nearby explorers stronger and is good at fighting Spy-like units.
* Perro de Presa: Dominican mercenary armed with a halberd. Incredibly destructive against cavalry.
* Pesetero: Basque skirmisher mercenary armed with a rifle and sword.
* Schlosswache: Grenadier mercenary from Baden incredibly resistant to range.
* Schütze: Skirmisher mercenary from Hesse with a long-distance attack.
* Souliote: Arvanite marksman that deals more damage the farther it is. Good against shock units and artillery.
* Suomen Kaarti: Finnish mercenary with incredible accuracy. Has bigger modifiers.
* Taura: Latin American melee infantry mercenary. Trickles Coin.
* Swiss Guard: Heavy hand infantry mercenary. Good against shock units and buildings.
* Uskok: Croatian naval ranged infantry. Ignores armor on range.
* Vistula Lancer: Heavy Polish cavalry armed with a lance. Good against infantry.
* Volontaire Gendarme: Luxembourgish shock cavalry with a trample attack.
* Walloon Guard: Hand infantry from southern Belgium armed with a halberd.
* Zuavo Baiano: Strong musketeer mercenary from eastern Brazil.

### Immigrant Military

The immigrant colonies available for Latin Americans partially substitute the role of the Tea House by offering immigrant military units that behave as mercenaries. Instead of coin, the immigrants cost shipments and come in batches. It is more restrictive in numbers, but it gives the player the choice of which unit to train.

## Changelog

1.0.14c:

* Bye Blandengue.