390 stone castles is too cheap

The upcoming Slav castles are I feel stonewise too cheap. The Frank bonus is already considered strong, and it’s just -25 % stonecost. Now Slavs are going to get -40 %. It’s barely more than a krepost, except it’s much beefier AND produces trebs (and researches techs and trains saboteurs). Bulgarians have a tradeoff between building castles and kreposts, Slavs don’t.

I suggest to reduce to -33 % at the upmost. The woodcost is more disturbing than anything else, in no instance any other civ spends wood on a castle and even Slavs don’t until they get their (Castle Age cheap) UT. So I suggest removing that alltogether.

Plus it’s not like the Slav castle produces a useless UU. (I’m not even sure there still are useless UUs, as devs are buffing less used ones; cool ballista elephant buff, not-so-cool mameluke buff, it’s already an oppressive unit when massed).
Boyars beat Frank paladins. And Boyars crush hussars so hard, it’s not even funny anymore. (7 hits vs 150 hits!)
Finally boyars are trained very fast (konnik 19s, cataphract 20s, boyar - who beats both -, just 15s, slightly more than heavy infantry UU). Many, many castles and fast training time?

3 Likes

Hoooo nice we finally have reasons to use Boyars once the tech is researched, plus lacking several key defensive tech must be OP for sure.
Man just stop with these claims, Slavs were boring to play as and they are going to be a lot more interesting topcik and to go for the UU, (heck I’m even talking to someone who probably barely plays the game lol).

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Not a nice thing to say, don’t you think?

For the record, I’m playing AoE II since AoK.

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Well, you fear that one of the least used UU is going to be OP just because of a UT that requieres a castle first already tells a lot don’t think? :man_shrugging:
Btw Franks have 25% cheaper castles as a civ bonus and I find Franks bonus a lot stronger (if not OP) than this new UT (Which isn’t even OP).

5 Likes

I think it’s a really good tech, but keep in mind Slavs don’t get most of the technologies for improving castles. The cost for the unique technology itself and the fact that the stone cost is converted to a wood cost rather than discounted outright also make this a tricky technology to afford a bit earlier on, meaning you’ll probably build more than just the one initial castle without using this tech. So by the time it makes sense to have the large discount you’re using the discount to buy unupgraded castles while the enemy has trebs and bombard cannons. Still very strong, but I’m willing to watch it play out for a patch before calling it OP.

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I think this bonus isn’t OP. I don’t even think we will see it in a lot of games. It’s very situational.
Especially in 1v1s.

Slavs castles and towers are underwhealming to say the least.

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The first castle gets no discount.
Then, we have to spend 600 resources to get this UT.
Then, starting from the second castle, every castle will cost 260W 390S (not just 390S)

Since the bonus starts only from the second castle, and needs 600 resources, it is actually underwhelming.

In contrast, the Franks still continue to get -25% cheaper castles without any UT and this discount is for first castle as well.

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You will only be able to mass produce these castles if you have an influx of trade in a team game. Stone becomes incredibly rare in one vs one. Portuguese ally contributes you stone from their resource generating building.

This still will be one of the weakest bonuses since you first must invest into a 650 stone Castle to then spend resources (likely needed elsewhere) on a tech only to build another or at most 2 more slightly discounted Castles.

3 Likes

I don’t think it’s OP, but I don’t think it’s bad at all, Slavs castles will be 100 stone cheaper than Frank castles after that tech, that shouldn’t be too hard to afford with their eco. The true letdown is that they didn’t at least give arrowslits and heated shot to help make the tech worth it for towers. Like let’s be real Slavs are trash no matter what on water maps, and the distribution fo arroslit is quite random. Aztecs for some reason get it (despite the lack of masonry screaming it’s not a defensive civ) meanwhile Slavs and Magyars don’t have it despite the whole “defense vs Turks/Mongols/Tatars” thing they had to go through irl.

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Yeah Slav Towers need some techs to be given to them now, in context of this new UT
Arrowslits alone is a big one, we need to have that on Slavs

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The problem with this tech is not the values but the concept.
They’ve turned Slavs into a twin brother of Franks, which they already were too similar to them. A total flaw both in terms of diversity and also due to the fact Franks are an awful design (unlike Slavs which are decent), you dont want any civ to be similar to Franks in this regard, and yes, Burgundians are another Franks-like civ, arguably the worst design in the game.

Cheap Castles, Framing bonus, Cavalry-Infantry composition, lack of Arbs/Cav Archer/Bracer, the only difference between the two is the emphasis on siege and gun powder, which becomes mostly relevant in Imp.

So definitely they should removing this UT altogether. Which is less likely to happen, since Devs almost never bail on bad decisions, which are often.

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11
I would never think about this
Good catch
I’m just saying that this new UT make Slavs “houses” expensive, costing 260 wood and 390 stone 11

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Or maybe we should see how this “trash towers and castles” UT turns out before we give them an added buff to said towers and castles.

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you need to pay the regular 650 stone for your first castle, and after that you need to invest quite some res into the UT. After those steps you will get a stone discount but have to PAY EXTRA WOOD. in no world these underwhelming castles (tech wise) are broken. Imo the Tech is a great tool to make it more compelling to go for the Bojars, which are realy seen these days.

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may be they should reduce hp for those castles

Why? Do franks have reduced hp?

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Slav UT is nothing in front of the OP Franks

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Not really, the tech is actually very cheap.

I wonder how the math turns out in terms of general stone availability. On a generic Arabia (or Arena), when you mine all Stone you have, that’s like. 3150 stone? So enough stone for 4 castles, some TCs, repairs and walls. With Detinets, you can afford 8 castles, or 7 castles, some TCs, repairs and walls?

Would be nice if someone did more math-y test, I don’t really know the stone tile amounts people usually have. :smiley:

(I think Franks bonus turns out to be 6 castles with some stone for TCs (not as much left over though), and Incas for 5 castles and enough for TCs, repairs, walls.)

Another idea could be to change the stone-wood with a 1:2 or 1:3 ratio, since wood anyway is more easy to get.

1 Like