Deicide4u

It's not an exploit. You're just playing against people who want to win, and they are using the strongest strategy available to them to achieve victory. This is like complaining about why Protoss players don't build Scouts, or why Terran players don't train Ghosts against Carriers in Brood War. They don't do that because they know all pros and cons of Scouts and Ghosts, and they want to win the match. If you don't care about winning, then sure, train cavalry with Spartans. You'll have access to 2 basic units that are easily countered.

Well, Spartans don't have good cavalry. That is one of their main weaknesses, the other being poor siege. Every civilization/faction has its strengths and weaknesses. The fact is, you don't choose a playstyle and go with any faction. You choose a faction because you like its playstyle, units and its quirks.

Zombie Alexander is not scary, he won't hurt you. Zombie Alexander:

Seleucids have long ranged cavalry archers, but the AI doesn't train many of them. However, they do train a lot of infantry archer mercenaries. Best way to counter them is melee cavalry, yes. Make sure you flank the archers from a side where their spearmen and pikemen won't touch you.

As said, none. Don't even bother, unless you have extreme excess food in the late game. In which case, there is no reason to improve the income, anyway. Your units can assume better positioning, especially ranged units. It reduces the empty walk time for archers to get into position. It also allows you to better micro the army. Otherwise, no other benefits and formations don't give bonuses in the base game. Walls can delay the AI, but they are not good against other players. There are some bugs that need to be fixed, mostly around wall snapping. Just practice and try to get familiar with the game. No shame in playing against Sandbox AI in your first matches.

Yeah, as I've said 100x already. Capture is a broken mechanic that allows things like these. If those hoplites had to damage your CC, their strategy would fail.

Daily reminder that Thrace Black Cloak sword champions also do circular splash damage. As an anegdote, it's funny that they would've destroyed Spartiates in early alpha versions, due to their counter damage bonus against spearmen.

I don't know about Athenian hoplites, but OP hoplites is all that Sparta has, besides Skiritai. And it's historically accurate, however imbalanced that may seem. Maybe the Athenian elite promotion to champion is a bit too much.

Athenian and Spartan Hoplites are OP by design. Use faster units to counter.

My first real game as the Germans. GermVSCart.zip

Right now, we literally have massive monolithic armies, with a sprinkled in ram when there's a Fortress to be razed. This is made possible by the capture mechanic, where you can just take over the enemy buildings without damaging them. It has been nerfed in R28, but it's bad even with the nerf. In the end, you can't nerf what's essentially a broken mechanic. Why are you against sword infantry being good at razing buildings? It's currently good against rams, why not against buildings? We don't have to touch Fortresses and towers, so that you still need siege to bring them down. But a center of a city (which CC stands for, even if its just one building) shouldn't need siege to destroy it. That's not realistic for a RTS game, where time matters. I don't have time to watch my 24 expensive champions, one of the strongest units in the game, try to raze a building for almost 2 minutes. Mind you, if you made some rams first, you wouldn't have 24 Spartiates, you'd have maybe 18. Arsenals and rams are expensive.

How long it takes for 24 Spartiates to bring down a CC to 235 HP? I'd reckon it's much longer than 25 seconds. If it takes less time to capture a building outright, why even damage it?

A fully upgraded swordsman champion still does 1 damage per hit to a CC. It's a waste of time to damage buildings with units, unless you got mace men or axe men. If I remember correctly, we had a change in A27 community mod that lowered building armor. Why didn't that change stick? So, either do one or the other. Some people want to see buildings razed to the ground without going to the trouble of making siege rams.

To be fair, even good players hardly ever train champions until late game.

I'm not sure if you want to do this. The major advantage of archers is their range. Because of that, you can better snipe with them, and they don't overkill as much as slingers or javelins. Don't forget their faster rate of fire, as well.