An underappreciated fact about the game is every type of troop has a place.
Haeduan are essentially the Gauls Legion
A duel role troop that is good in offense and def they come at a premium however so why on earth would you build them as a defensive player over cheap phalanx or druid riders.
Well before i go into my best reasons why i will tell you a very basic reason why.
You must clear robber camps as an effective governor and why tie up crop consumption in def-less swordsmen and thunders when you can have a trooper which will clear these camps but still preform well in def.
That is the basic concept that most players grasp and appreciate however what i will point out next is something most players do not understand well.
They consumes 3 crop so i put in brackets what def they have in terms of 1 crop (so they are comparable)
When you smithy a troop there stats change however so lets study them when fully upgraded.
An Haeduan has
88.1 Inf Def (29.36)
208.8 Cav Def (69.6)
Now lets compare them to the Druid Rider (there immediate competitor in the role)
145 Inf Def (72.5)
76 Cav Def (38)
Now I am going to show some quick math to highlight there average def by combining inf def and cav def (the number in the brackets) then dividing by 2 to give a defensive value which ignores unit type
Haeduan Total
(98.96/2= 49.5)
Druid Rider Total
(110.5/2= 55.3)
So why did i do that? well as it turns out Cav def and Inf is unanimous once you are dealing with a balanced attacker
What do i mean by balanced attacker?
If your attacker has about equal attack values in inf offense and cav offense that is a balanced attacker.
As it turns out when defending against a balanced attacker both defensive values are munched together by the game and your troops preform based on their average def.
Let me Highlight this with examples
If you don't believe me run these examples in the simulator and discover for yourself
75 clubs attacking 50 Haeduan
Attacker loses 100% defender loses 100%
Now lets add 20 Knights to the attacker to make it a balanced force
keep in mind we just added alot and i mean alot more attackers but how do the 50 Haeduan preform now?
75 clubs and 20 knights attacking 50 Haeduan
attacker loses 91%
Now lets add only 20 haeduan to the defender side because that's only fair if the attacker gets extra as well
75 Clubs and 20 knights against 70 Haeduan
attacker loses 100% defender loses 66%
See where I am going with this?
All late game hammers will have a fairly balanced force there fore we should only be paying attention to there combined average def which was
49.5 for had's
55.3 for riders
when you really think about it Druid Riders only preform 10% better then Haeduans per crop, not to mention you can now clear robber camps and when defending with Had's I would not be overly concerned about there lack of inf def.
Another point is when sniping attacks more often then not the pesky ones are pure cav attacks when defending against pure cav attacks the had's give almost a breathtaking 70 def per crop while your riders will get squashed at 38