The Scarab

People know the Scarab for being:

a) Expensive
b) Slow
c) Good against buildings.

In this article, I will try and show you what the Scarabs are REALLY like, and prove/disprove the "myths" surrounding them.
First we need their stats:

Cost: 300 Food 20 Favour
HP: 670
Speed: 3.20
Hack Armour: 30%
Pierce Armour: 75%
Hack Damage: 6
Crush Damage: 12

x5 Bonus vs Buildings
Special ability: When killed, the Scarab damages all units within 6 range with its acid blood. Its acid blood does 23-29 damage to each unit within 6 range

NOTE: The bonus against buildings was found from AOMH unit tables. The Special ability stats were researched and tested by me.

So generally, VERY expensive, slow, very weak base hack and crush attack, low hack armour.
But, very high HP for a Heroic MU, (rivaled only by the Mountain Giant, Battle Boar and Hydra) very high pierce armour, incredible bonus and useful special ability.

Let's try one against a house to see how good it really is.

NOTE: Attacks are recorded per hit, not per second. This is because the Scarab does NOT attack once per second, but approximately every 1.5 seconds.

Test 1: 1 Scarab vs 1 Greek House (unupgraded)

Greek house stats
HP: 450
Crush Armour: 5%
Hack Armour: 30%
Pierce Armour: 95%

Scarab deals 117 damage to house per hit
Scarab destroys house in 4 hits in 5 seconds

Very quick and easy for the Scarab.
How about a house with the Masons upgrade?

Test 2: 1 Scarab vs 1 Greek House + Masons

House stats:
HP: 517
Crush Armour: 9%
Hack Armour: 30%
Pierce Armour: 95%

Scarab deals 113 damage to house per hit.
Scarab destroys house in 6 seconds in 8 seconds.

The Masons doesn't really make much of a difference to the Scarabs attack.

NOTE: I also tested the Scarab against an Egyptian house, and a Norse house. The base attack was still 117, but the Norse house was destroyed quicker because of lower HP.

So why does the Scarab do SO well against buildings? 117 is almost 10x their base crush attack of 12, so their bonus against buildings is x10. Let's see if that's true.
Like the Phoenix, the Scarab attacks buildings (and units) with crush damage and hack damage. Here's the math(s):

Crush damage: 12 x 5 = 60.
60 - 3 (Crush armour) = 57.

Hack damage: 6 x 5 = 30
30 - 9 (Hack armour) = 21.

So the Scarab's attacks + bonuses are:

Hack damage: 21
Crush damage: 57

Then why does it do a whopping 117 as its base attack against all unupgraded building with this armour?
Maybe its just houses, what about stronger buildings?

NOTE: Armour on these buildings are the same as the houses, although their HPs are higher.

Test 3: 1 Scarab vs 1 Fortress (unupgraded)
Scarab destroys fortress in 18 hits in 25 seconds.

Test 4: 1 Scarab vs 1 Migdol Stronghold (unupgraded)
Scarab destroys Migdol Stronghold in 24 hits in 33 seconds.

Test 5: 1 Scarab vs 1 Hillfort (unupgraded)
Scarab destroys Hillfort in 17 hits in 24.

Hmmm, its base attack is still 117. But why does it have a higher bonus then stated on this site?
I have come to the conclusion that the Scarab has a higher bonus against buildings than x5. I will research into this and find the answer as soon as I can. (see bottom*)

Anyway, back to the tests. How does the Scarab compare to a Siege Tower?

Siege Tower stats:

Cost: 200 Wood, 100 Gold, 3 Pop spaces
HP: 360
Speed: 2.90
Hack armour: 5%
Pierce armour: 95%
Crush damage: 50

So the Siege Tower is cheaper, has higher pierce armour and a higher base crush attack.
But, lower HP, its slower and has terrible hack armour.

Test 6: 1 Siege Tower (unupgraded) vs 1 Greek House (unupgraded)

Siege Tower deals 190 damage to house per hit.
Siege Tower destroys house in 3 hits in 8 seconds.

Well, its attack is significantly higher, and takes less hits to destroy the house.
However, the Scarab destroys the house QUICKER than the Siege Tower. This makes it a weaker building killer, but a quicker one, and speed is what usually matters when destroying buildings.

How about against a Fortress?

Test 7: 1 Siege Tower (unupgraded) vs 1 Fortress (unupgraded)
The Siege Tower destroys the Fortress in 12 hits in 43 seconds.

That's almost twice as slow as the Scarab. Could 2 siege towers match a scarab's taste for buildings?

Test 8: 2 Siege Towers (unupgraded) vs 1 Fortress (unupgraded)
The siege towers destroy the Fortress in 20 seconds.

That's only just quicker than 1 Scarab. Which means 2 Siege Towers are pretty much as good as 1 Scarab.
400 Wood, 200 Gold and 6 pop spaces vs 300 Food, 20 Favour and 5 pop spaces. Which would you choose?

Although Scarabs are "better" building killers, they do have one big advantage: They're MUs, and heroes rip them to shreds.
Saying that, with its 5% Hack armour and low HP, melee heroes will destroy a Siege Tower easily. But the part that makes it useful is against ranged heroes such as priests. With 95%, it will hardly scratch it. Compare that with a Scarab who dies miserably to heroes, we can see that the Siege Tower does a lot better against Egypt than the Scarab.

Summary:

Scarabs are ONLY good against buildings. Using them against human units is a waste of time and resources. The only reason it can beat most human units is because of its high HP.

Compared to Siege Towers, Scarabs are better in terms of speed and cost, but have a weaker attack. It's lower attack is not really important when you look at how slow the siege tower is to attack.

In my opinion, Scarabs should only be used against the Greeks, and possibly the Norse. Because the Egyptians have some stronger buildings, you need a higher attack to take them down, instead of speed. Against weak Norse buildings, Scarabs can take down buildings very quickly, but are likely to run into Hersir or Jarls, a Scarabs worst nightmare (apart from Bellerophon ).

The main reason why you should use Scarabs against the Greeks is that their buildings aren't TOO strong, a nice balance where you don't need so much strength as with higher HPed buildings. Particularly against Poseidon, when his Milita appear (this is the only exception to not attacking human units with Scarabs). If you have no backup, then Scarbs can kill militia pretty quickly without receiving too much damage (unlike a siege tower which will receive a lot due to its low hack armour).
Against Hades though, a mixture of Siege Towers and Scarabs is probably best.

So in conclusion, the Scarab is one of the best building killers in the game, but does terribly against EVERYTHING else (unlike the Mountain Giant). It may be slow, expensive and UGLY, but it really does excel against buildings. Use them if you have enough food and pop space, only use them against buildings (particularly Norse and Greek) and keep them away from Heroes!

* EDIT: It came to me in a dream. Because the Scarab attack every 1.5 seconds, it does 1.5x its base attack. Multiply that by 5 and you have the total. Not it's base attacks (12, 6) x 5.
This makes the stats correct.

[This message has been edited by ArtemisChimera (edited 09-14-2003 @ 07:31 AM).]