Nobles' Court

A Nobles' Court is a special building which hosts religion-related units and technologies. Historically, these buildings would constitute parliaments or quarters for the nobility, and could be used by the sovereign to enact laws and to restrain the unruliness of the aristocracy by forcing them to dwell near the capital, where they could be better moderated.

Nobles' Courts are available only in the Castle Age, and require the following technologies in order to be constructed:

• Military Engineering from the Fort
• Communalism from Tower
• Organised Religion from House of Worship

Complete list of prerequisite technologies:

Library techs:

• Science Level 2 (Natural Law)
• Civics Level 5 (Sovereignty)
• Commerce Level 2 (Cartography)
• Military Level 4 (Standing Army)

Buildings required: sawmill, castle, tower, university, house of worship

So the powerful and strong units of the Nobles' Court are available only to the most advanced and complex of societies!

Units trained

Agents

Asian and Muslim factions have the ability to recruit very powerful and specialised agents from the nobles' court. Although most of them have different abilities, one trait that they do share is the ability to perform assasinations against any and all units, including spies.

• Imperial legates are Asian agents which have extra hitpoints and craft. While they are cloaked when moving, they are also capable of detecting hidden units, neutralising enemy spies, and assassination.
• Monomi are the ultimate agent, and are a Japanese unique unit upgrade of the Imperial legate. They are faster, have the most hitpoints and craft, and are capable of performing assasinations, counterintelligence and sabotage missions.

Christian

Units trained

Name	Class		Name	Class
Lay Knight	Super-heavy cavalry		Brother-Knight	Offensive chivalric order infantry
Holy Order Marshall	Super-heavy cavalry		Order Knight	Super-heavy cavalry
Sergeant	Defensive chivalric order infantry		Holy Order Sergeant	Light swordsmen
Stormenn	Offensive chivalric order infantry

Centralisation

"The moving force is national honour, not the injury of a single individual."

• Grants access to advanced units from the barracks and the stable, and obsoletes various foot mercenaries for various factions, notably:
  • Basque Warriors
  • Brigand
  • Caucasus Mountain Men
  • Slavic Raiders
  • Merchant Cavalry
• Units upgraded with Centralisation are costlier to create, but their abilities over Dark Age and Castle units must be attested. A Man-at-Arms may cost more than normal knights, but the strength of their armour, their mounts and their killing power simply cannot be ignored!

Cost	Requirements	Leads to
900; 1250 Time to complete: Long

Muslim units and techs

Units

Name	Class		Name	Class
Mamluk Lancer	Heavy cavalry		Ghilman Cavalry	Medium raiding cavalry
Tabardiyyah Infantry	Heavy polearms infantry		Fedayeen	Super agent

Fedayeen are Muslim agents which can only bribe other units, but have extra hitpoints and craft, are cloaked when moving, and have a very high attack that can kill most units in one hit. It is to be noted that an exact replica of this unit, known as the hashishin, are recruitable by some non-Muslim factions (notably Venice and Russia) as mercenary units, and also feature greatly in some CtW scenarios.

Darul Islam

"Believers, be steadfast and guard your borders."

• Increases knowledge accumulation to the highest possible maximum without wonders
• Houses of worship won't convert in enemy territory
• Opens access to a select corps of military units.

Cost	Requirements	Leads to
990 Time to complete: Long

Asian

• Imperial Legate

Japanese

• Monomi

Mongol

Name	Class		Name	Class
Noyan	Super cavalry archer		Keshig Guard	Super cavalry archer

Other

Name	Class
Ghilman Cavalry	Medium raiding cavalry
Royal Hounds	Light swordsmen

Upgrades

Imperial Mandate

"The Empire is a family of which the Emperor is the father."

• Requires: Asceticism from house of worship; Land Law from Granary.
• For Japan, Divine Mandate allows access to several units: the Monomi; Saburai Cavalry, Saburai Archers and Foot Saburai fron the Nobles' Court; and Ashigaru from the Barracks, upgraded into a Dojo.
• Grants the use of the following buildings:

Production/low-level defence

• Munitions Ministry (China and Serbia)
• Constabulary (China, Mongolia, Armenia)
• Dojo (Japan)
• Naval Cantonment (China, Japan)
• Chapterhouse (Byzantium, Serbia, Russia)
• Magistracy (Byzantium, Serbia, Armenia, Russia)
• Eunuch's Court (Byzantium, China)
• Imperial City (China, Mongolia, Japan)

High-level defence

• Bastion (all)
• Stronghold (Mongolia, China)

Cost	Requirements	Leads to
880; 880 Time to complete: Long