I meant unique champions, like the Mauryan Elephants, the Persian Inmortals, and the Mauryan Amazon women (I forget their real name). These units are a lot more unique in play style than the basic units, and I feel like because the stats are so generic across the civs, the game really just becomes who can boom faster, whereas fantasy RTSs often end up becoming more strategy focused with varying tactics against various civs.

Acknowledging that following call is not relevant to 1v1 and no-team matches: Don't forget the impact of Alliances with strong Team Bonuses.

0 A.D. does cosmetic uniqueness well, by making every building and unit of each civilization look different. Champion units are nothing special, they are only stronger versions of basic unit templates. Also, each champion template is the same across civilizations, with some small differences unique to some civs. Again, the game treats uniqueness through special civilization-specific bonuses and upgrades. Every unit template is the same and has identical base stats. If an Elite spearman of your civ looks like he's stronger than an Elite spearman of another civ, he just looks stronger. They are the same unit template, so they have the same stats.

I’ll probably test my ideas out in a small mod before merging them with something else. I feel that they should be further exaggerated, not to the point of cartoonishness, but so that the differences are noticeable to someone who has maybe not played every race extensively. For example, using the cavalry example you mentioned above, the Carthaginian cavalry is only barely faster, and so it has to be directly compared against a standard cavalry unit to notice the difference.   Cosmetic uniqueness is important in many ways, it makes each civ feel like a unique race, it allows players of varying play styles to pick the race that most fits them, and it allows players of lesser skill to beat more advanced players simply through choosing the right race for the right situation (though again, over exaggeration must be avoided here). As part of this uniqueness, the ‘baseline roster’ should be changed for each race, so that the game is interesting long before champions are unlocked in city phase (champions are atm the one real unique units in the game). Again, not over exaggerated, but for example the changes I have above should be generally applied to the majority of units for each civ. You all can expect my mod sometime soon, most likely after I get the next release of Hyrule Conquest: Revival out.

You are good enough for TGs and I know how to balance you. That's all that matters.