Good Indie Troops

[name thief]

What the title says. What independent troops if any are worthwhile to recruit during a game.

[Torgon]

Commanders-
Mages that provide magic diversity or sages
Scouts
Commanders to ferry troops around

Units-
Woodsmen Blowpipes - one of the best units in the game

Hoburg crossbowmen - one of the best ranged units in the game because they're so easy to mass. I do a little dance of joy if I find these guys and I have mages to cast wind guide.

Other archers if you don't have national archers

Amphibious troops to break into the water early

Perhaps knights or heavy cav if your nation doesn't have cavalry and you have some pressing need for a lance charge, but this is pretty niche and they're pricy so probably not.

Some of the amazon sacreds can be decent if you have a bless that fits them but they're also pretty expensive.

Thats all I can think of.

[rdonj]

Indy commanders, mages, scouts, priests and archers. Okay, and depending on the situation sometimes woodsmen with blowpipes, wolf tribe warriors, and light infantry can be worth buying, especially the ones with javelins. Sometimes you can find sacreds, the jade lizard riders being generally the best of those. Or sometimes you'll run into a province that lets you recruit elephants, which is another sometimes-useful one. Other than that there's not much that you'd generally want.

I like how torgon and I said basically the same thing. And yeah, hoburg crossbowmen are just awesome. 8g5r for a crossbow, that's all you need right there.

It's worth noting that the recruitable amphibians suck pretty badly, but it's true that they'll help you get into the water. And occasionally ichtyids can be worth recruiting in small numbers just for the nets they carry.

[Shangrila00]

I've recruited heavy cav with kite shields to be arrow catchers for nations that don't have any of their own that have map move 2. It's pretty expensive, but still better than arrows hitting unshielded troops or ones with only bucklers.

Lion tribe archers can be useful for nations that can put together map move 3 armies.

I really wish Nightmares aren't so awful at actual fighting for their sky high price, though I guess it would be overpowered if you can get the equivalent of sacred recruitable demon knights. Not terrible like the Gryphon riders at least, I mean 125g for a 10 hp unit. The lizard and pegasus riders are pretty nice with a good bless though, at least in the EA where their lackluster damage output doesn't hurt too bad. Pegasus Riders are practically EA Tien Chi's other national sacred, since they go so well with flying celestial masters to lead, bless, and buff them, and Amazons are pretty common in the EA.

[bbz]

Ichtysatyr Soldier is another good one as a line holder/heavy inf (15 protection 14 def is better than some of the sacreds early age). I'ts not really Indie since it comes from a site but the site requires 0 magic so its visible as soon as you get the province so if you get some of those use them(although they are somewhat hard to mass)

[Shardphoenix]

Chrystal tribe amasons are good in EA because of their 12 precision and lack of heavy infantry.

[Soyweiser]

Sigh...

How much hand-holding do you need?

A better question would be, how do I evaluate potential uses of units.