Here are the stats for a Zeus hoplite with no upgrades
Cost: 50 food 40 gold
Population: 2
Hack Damage: 8
HP: 115
Hack Armor: 35%
Pierce Armor: 15%
Crush Armor: 99%
Speed: 4.7 meters/second
Line of sight: 16 meters
Training time: 14 seconds

Why hoplites (any type) are the best all around unit
1. They beat every type of unit pop and cost effectively. i.e. they beat ulfs,hipps, and tox cost and pop effectively as well as units in any way like them. Only hard counters can beat them.
2. They have a lot of armor so are hard to get rid of as they raze your base.
3. Great to stop cav raids
4. Have a great cost. At 50 food and 40 gold its easy to afford them because they dont overly drain any resource.
5. For such a strong unit they are made quite fast
6. Good LOS allows them to gauge whether they want a given fight or not before a cav army could.

What makes Zeus' the best
BONUSES
1 +12% speed
This seems at face value to just be a matter of convieniance but I truly value this bonus VERY much. It raises the hoplites speed from 4.2 to 4.7. This turns it from a slow unit to a unit that only cav can catch up to. This makes it very possible to do many things that ill touch on later. Here are the basic uses for this bonus

1a If your army is across the map and your base or oen of your settlements is attacked a zeus hoplite army will get there much quicker (around 5 seconds most of the time) and curb the razing of your base faster. Also in the same way if you attack the enemy from one side of his base you can get to the other side to attack there faster.

1b This makes hops effective units vs archers. In a 10vs10 matchup betwen hops and tox's non zeus hops have an average of 4 hops left at the end whereas zeus hops have 5 left. Thats a 10% difference which is a lot. Of course they will have a meatshield so i tested that. 6 hipps and 10 tox vs 18 hops (as close to pop and cost equality as possible) the zeus hops win with an average of 7 left and non zeus hops win with an average of 6 left. This is because one and sometimes two non zeus hops die to arrow fire before they close in whereas the zeus hop will get in one or two hits on teh hipps before dying. This makes a difference because that hipp will die easier meaning that more hops will live to fight the tox meanign more hops will live to the end. Also note that it is pretty amazing how well the hoplite as a unit did in these tests.

1c If you dont have a forward base this bonus is truly a lifesaver. As you are sending reinforcments the faster the unit is the faster he will get to the front line and help you. A zeus hoplite can get to battle 4-7 sec before his counterpart. When this happens a large number of times it really adds up and gives the Zeus player an advantage.

1d In a battle with a lot of melee units everyoen knows that it takes a while for the units that were in the back of your column to get there and fight someone. They end up going all the way around the enemy army. With the zeus hoplite your whole army will be fighting for longer during the battle. This could make or break some very close battles. Also against a smaller force your army coudl surround his army faster resulting in even larger of a slaughter

1e With their buidlign killing bonus youll find zeus hoplites killing tc's and towers all the time. The extra speed helps them close in faster and lose less men. This combined with faster reinforcements make it hard to stop a hoplite rusher.

1f There are bound to be battles that you realize you dont want to fight at the last minute. The extra speed not only allows you to run away to the safety of your base faster it also means that only cavalry can catch you most of the time. And guess what hoplites counter cavalry. The same goes for what i call hoplite raiding. It is performed when you run in and take down a buildign or tow then when his army comes up you run away. The greatness in this lies in that this bonus means that only the units that hops counter can catch them whiel they run away.

2 2x multiplier vs buildings
This is a pretty straightforward bonus but is IMO one of the best bonuses in teh game. Its an offensive bonus which means that you have to be offensive to use it which is what you want. Basically it means that a buildign that could have taken 30 sec to take down takes only 15 sec now. When you are talking about a decent length of time the greatness of this is realized. If you surprise attack his base and his units will take 45 seconds to arrive back at his base you can take down three decently armored buidlings whereas a non zeus hoplite army would only take down one and slgihtly damage another. When talking about a lot of hops this again is made better. You can seriously (i have done it) raze a whole base while your opponent gets his army back. This bonus also gives you one fareaching head up against your enemy. You have siege in classical. Other civs need to go to heroic to do that during which time your army will raze his base. With seige earlier thaere is almost no reason to go to heroic wherease your opponent cant compete offensively with you on the same level unless he goes heroic. This is 1300 less resources and 1 min idle tc time. Youd really have to slack off on your eco to have the same eco he does at this point. There are a few strats that utilize this bonus to its fullest

2a Hoplite Rush
This involves getting to classical before 5 min. This is done by putting almost no vils on gold then once you get to classical making all your new vils go to gold. You then pump out hops. Once you have ten you start to raze his base. The first thing you take out are resource dropoffs (only vs greek and eggy), then you take out his military buildings. After that you take out his houses so that he'll have no chance of getting an army an time soon because hed have to remake the military buildings and the houses. Then you take down his temple. At that point you go on and take out his tc. Its a good idea to upgrade you hops to medium hops once you have ten of them. Also for this its best to go athena. This is not for the techs although if the game drags on they will be useful but its for restoration. With a small amount of people it will be very good to have an instant healing so that he cant just whittle your army away with tower and tc fire as well as the small amount of units he may field. If the rush fails go heroic whip out your petroboli and hydras use bronze and watch his base fall.
Best uses vs atties, norse, and greeks
COUNTER: pump out hard counters to the hoplite early. i.e. make throwing axemen, axemen etc. They can rape hops but of course if the zeus player chooses another strat youre at a loss
COUNTER TO THE COUTNER: Go hermes and get cents. Raid wood vs norse to stop him from making a considerable amount of ta. if you are taking out his buildings he'll be short of wood anyways so he'll be forced to make units that the hop beats cost and pop effectively. Also cents are very good vs hard counters to infantry because they wont have much peirce armor, so use your cents in battle if you are faced with anti infantry. Basically raid the resource that the counter uses most and use your cents in battle as much as possible.

2b Centaur Strangle
This is a well known strat where you immediatley make a few cents once you hit classical and raid the enemy to hell with them. You may be saying well what do hops have to do with this. Well ill tell you. You go to classical a bit later so you have the danger that the enemy may attack before you do. Having a few hops at your base will stop any cav raiders. Then once your cents have done enough damage run in there with a good 20-30 hops and finish him off. Use ceasefire to cancel any gp's he may try and use on you.
Best used vs eggy because they are hard to rush but good to raid effectively.
COUNTER Make heroes and use your free mu if you play in titans to kill the cents. Generally the only counter to this strat is to hit him early
COUNTER TO THE COUNTER bolt his free mu or his hero if hes greek. If you have a problem with heroes split your cnets into groups making it harder for the heroes to be everywhere.

2c Hoplite Strangle
Get to classical reasonably early (5:15) with hermes. If you are rushed or heavily raided use ceasefire, otherwise pump out two cents and raid him a lot. As you are doing that build up a force of 10 hops. Then just proceed to hit and run his buildings and using your decent speed to run away from his army. Keep reinforcing your army and intensifying your attacks. Basically he cant build up at all because you are taking out his buildigns at such an fast and unstoppable speed. With this strat it would be a good idea to have some tox in your army to take out infantry counters when you finally do battle your opponents (hopefuly when he has almost no buildings).
Best used vs any civ but maybe less so vs eggy
COUNTER make a large army and attack his base razing it ot hell giving him some of his own medicine. also make axemen
COUNTER TO THE COUNTER leave some tox behind to deal with any surprise attacks while your army gets back there. Take your cents one periodical raids of his axemen who have little pierce armor.

2d Fast Mythic
Basically get to mythic in 10-13 minutes leaving some hops to defend against raids and upgrading your towers and generally being defensive (USE CEASEFIRE!!!!!!) Once you get to mythic use your extra gps to turn the tide of the game then fully upgrade your hops. Fully upgraded hops are incredible. Obvioulsy make myrmidons as well but they probably wont be your main unit do to the fact that hops use a medium amount of two resources meaning that htey drain neither.
best against eggy
COUNTER: Rush them early while raiding their wood to stop them from getting towers.
COUNTER TO THE COUNTER use ceasefire to its fullest and have multiple wood operations to keep up the flow.

2e Minotaur-tox army
Make a load of minotaurs as a meatshield for your tox army. Obviously this has little to do with hops but i find it useful to leave them behind to deal with cav raiders

As you can see Zeus hops are truly great units that should be utilized much more.

NOTE I realize that this topic seems to say to make only hops all the time. I only support that in a hoplite rush where you cant afford to make another military buidling otherwise its good to make some tox as well.

[This message has been edited by lessthanjakeman9 (edited 04-15-2004 @ 03:29 PM).]