A few balance suggestions

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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I think most of us agree that the current balance for the civs is pretty good. However there are some civs that need some tweeks. Here are a few suggestions from me:

Burmese: Swap their unique techs, and change its prices accordingly. Howdah its more of an Imperial Age tech, and the new effect of Manipur Cavalry is more useful for Burmese in Castle Age, where they struggle the most.

Byzantines: Greek Fire doesn´t low the accuracy of Fire Ships.

Cumans: Feudal Town Center is constructed 50% slower. The problem for that bonus is that its way too slow to build. This would make their feudal boom more viable.

Indians: Shatagni doesnt low accuracy from Hand Cannons.

Italians: Silk Road: Reduces the cost of trade units by 33% to all team members. I think this would be much more userfull in team games, but to counter balance the effect, the discount should be reduced.

Lithuanians: Relic bonus is capped back at 5. Now that Blast Furnace has been removed, I think it would be fine if the original cap for the bonus is restored. We still wouldn’t have those broken Paladins from DE’s release day.

Mongols: Nomads now affects destroyed Town Centers. Just to make that tech a bit more usefull :v.

Portuguese: Organ Gun: Restore the original +1 bonus against infantry. Organ guns are a completely useless unit, they should get at least an anti-Infantry theme.

Saracens: Madrasah: Change effect that monks cost 33% less. Again, to make another useless tech a bit more usefull.

Spanish: Bloodlines and trash unit upgrades cost no gold. I think this bonus would make a good sinergy with their goldless Blacksmith upgrades. The bloodlines one would be specially great to improve their early game.

Turks: Any idea how to change the gunpowder techs costing 50% less? Back in Age of Kings it was a good bonus, but now that the only techs that applies to are Bombard Tower and Elite Cannon Galleon, its pretty useless in open land maps.

Vietnamese: Conscription no longer free but available in Castle Age. For me Vietnamese are fine, but I think it would be a better bonus.

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As much as I’d love this lithuanians don’t need buffs.

I’d just have nomads give the huns effect of unlocking 200 pop.

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Agree, with the recent manipur cav change this should definetely be swapped.
But i don’t know if this is enough to make the civ finally competitive again.

I don’t think we should work in this direction now. The feudal boom for a single civ was an experiment. But it showed that it is basically impossible to balance. I could actually think about allowing all civs to have a second TC in feudal and Cumans some bonus to this. This could be interesting. Otherwise I would even possibly think of removing the 2nd TC from Cumans strategic repertoire.

Maybe a bit too much, I think 25 % is more than enough. Question regarding this, actually: Has anyone tried to use Italians as the “trade carry” of the team? Like Italians making 150 trade carts and then giving tribute to all the other players in the team?

No, that was too much. I think Lith are in a soldi spot anyways.

I would like to see an organ gun rework. Cause sometimes this unit is totally OP, sometimes it is complete trash. I would like to see it with comparably low damage but very high Rof, this would make a completely new type of unit in the game, designed to defend important map positions.

I’d rather have some tool against archery for saracens. Not another against heavy cav, they don’t have to fear regardless.

Spanish are already a vers strong arena civ, this would only push them stronger there. If I would change something there I would probably improve their skirmishers a bit. Probably spanish and portuguese could get genitours (even from feudal).

Yeah also turks could get something on open maps. Though their good scout line actually is quite nice for a solit opener and the insane cav archer line makes an insane endgame even on open maps.
I don’t have much experience with this civ though, so I can’t really tell where and how much tweaking they could use.

IDK Vietnamese is one of these civs only pros seem to really “understand”. I have no idea how to tweak them if this is even necessary atm. MAybe just a bit more clear gameplan would make the civ more appealing to learn. In general the “anti-archer archer civ” design makes it hard to balance it among all elos I think.

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I play almost only turks and my Elo is arround 1100, low, I know, but, taking this in count, the problem I found with turks is that you can´t make mistakes with from castle Age onward because you can’t count with pikes or skirms as backup… So, what about change the gunpowder techs bonuses for a discount and training time buff for both, pikes and skirms. So, you have a quick but poor response. Feudal pikes/skirms are still weak for Castle Age, but if ou can mass them quickly maybe can hold the position

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if we cap it at 5, Lithuanian paladins will get 21 attack and Elite Leitis 23 attack.
I don’t think it will change much anyways, in 1v1 you usually get 2 or 3 relics as liths and going paladin in 1v1 isn’t even that popular, and getting 5 relics in 1v1 isn’t even close to be easy (unless is wolf hill lol), plus Leiciai is weaker to archers.
I would like it as it will make sure the Lith paladin is still the strongest one.

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Yes. If we miss the old effect of the Manipur, we could change the infantry attack bonus into that the cavalry and UU +1/+2/+3 or +2/+4/+6 attack against the buildings in the feudal/castle/imperial age.

Ummmm, the Byz are not the popular navy civ. It may need other benfits that are available on the land, such like the old effect of boiling oil or making allies able to construct fire towers.

It is already slower than the regular TC in the castle age actually. Their problem is the Cuman mercenaries.

For balance, let the attack of the leiciai down maybe.

That is what I have supported for a long time. Even the higher cost is acceptable for this.

It may still be helpless until it could gain the 2nd effect benefiting the economy or the other units rather than the monks, so are the Orthodoxy and the Inquisition.

I’d still like to give them the crossbowmen at least. Make them more flexible in the early game.
Similar to giving the Teutons the light cavalries, people may not accept them although.

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Exactly, don’t give Spanish crossbows, it takes away their identity. It’s cool having the two civs without crossbows, Teutons with no LC, Turks with no E-Skirm of Pike, Malay with no 2nd cav armor, etc. It can be annoying and sometimes make them weak, but it makes them more unique. Also, why would you need armor when you can spam the map with elephants that are cheaper than knights? :joy:

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Also what the hell is going on on that suggestion of all trash units upgrades gold cost removed, that’s objectively broken.

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Well, i think that would take away part of their identity.

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Well, since Lithuanians don’t get blast furnace anymore it wouldn’t be so broken. Also it is pretty difficult to get all five relics in a 1v1.

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Ok, if it sounds like that, what about those costing 50% less?

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I hit upon a new idea. Supply 50% of the max pop cap directly.
For example in a 200 pop game, the pop cap would become 175 after hitting the Nomads if there is 75 before researching. In other words, you could keep 100 pop cap even if all the houses, TCs and castles have been destroyed. That could keep the usage of houses.

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Ummm. I can understand. I just regard the conquistadors as well as the missionaries are already enough to present the identity of the Spanish although.

Since they have no arbalester, their archer-line has no potential whatever. Their blacksmith bonus actually fit the feudal archer strategy so gaining the crossbowmen make them more flexible in the early game when the Spanish are weaker. So that the investing in archers would not become a pure waste in the early game, helping them transition to the castle age.

Btw, if we need a no-crossbow civ, the Persians could remove it and gain the bracer.

I think that the situation of the Malay elephants is different from the Spanish archer and the Teuton light cavalry. They have a huge bonus.

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Their feudal boom doesn’t have to be more viable, it’s another strategy option competing for space in the Cumans feudal age. They already have cheaper ranges and stables, which makes feudal aggression better. Let’s not forget about feudal rams either.

The relic bonus at 5 for paladins was never that big a deal (as opposed to 3 or 4). Getting all five relics shouldn’t happen unless you’re playing against someone who simply ignores them, and then the payoff practically doesn’t make a difference except against Halbs (where it does indeed make a huge difference, but again, all five relics against an opponent who should be able to think).

The difference between 23 and 22 attack in actual TTK is usually negligible, as it just means even more overkill damage and not much else… The first nerf to the Relic bonus was to strip the bonus from the Hussar line, an extremely necessary nerf, as Hussars were insane with the extra attack. Small bonuses like that make a much bigger difference on units with small numbers to begin with.

Disagree entirely. They are roundly efficient units that suffer practically only against Siege, and in low numbers, against Cavalry. You’ll find that fielding Organ guns is actually really inexpensive once you get them going, since their turnover is usually pretty low. Low turnover means more to sling in a team game or fewer villagers (ergo, more units) to support them on the field.

Ehhh. But do they need an earlygame buff? They have full trash, fully upgraded in the lategame, they have conqs in castle age, they have faster walling, I don’t think their issues are due to a lack of options, I think their current struggles are due to the meta, and how they are played within it.

Yeah. It should be changed. Every gunpowder unit besides Bombard Cannon used to be locked behind an additional technology after Chemistry (Hand cannoneer used to need the Hand Cannon upgrade, we all know they just removed the Cannon Galleon tech, etc.) and that was the main effect of the bonus. Clearly, it wouldn’t affect a whole lot if they just made BBT and ECG instantly upgraded in Imperial. I think that might even be a little bit weak compared to what we have now with Bohemians getting Chemistry in Castle age making a big difference to the Archers in an earlier age and unlocking the Hand cannon so much sooner.

That’s a pretty big change. Unnecessary, and big.

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The relic bonus at +5 plus blast furnace gave to Lithuanian paladins the chance to kill any halb and elite eagle warrior in 3 hits (excluding Mayan one, which needed 5), arbs in 2 hits (except vietnamese) and dealing min 20 damage to any unit with 3 melee armor or less, while also having more PA and HP than Elite Leitis, plus being easily created since castle age, was broken on TGs, and ofc the relic bonus on hussars was also broken because it made a light cav unit with the same attack as a byzantine paladin and killing even champions cost effectively.

The latest nerf was just to allow that winged hussar (which is not that better in combat than generic hussar) and to make Leiciai the high attack cavalry unit of the civ, but at the same time that change was barely effective as Lithuanians are still killing all in castle age with 16 attack Knights and evemn Leitis is barely used (evidenced in KOTD).

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You are talking about a situation where you’re needing all five of a randomly placed object on a map with a second player who should realistically be able to contest it and prevent such an occurrence. It’s a big deal when it works, sure. If the Lithuanians often get five relics and fully activate the effect, that’s a condemnation of the general skill of players completely ignoring free resources and giving a massive edge to their opponents, not an indication of a powerful bonus.

I made this case when I called for removing the bonus against Hussar (which it desperately needed) when saying that if your opponent has five relics against you, you’ve very likely lost regardless which civ it is. The relic bonus was simply far more potent for the Hussar than the Paladin, even in the mythical five-relic-your-opponent-has-ignored-map-control-and-played-for-seven-layer-fortified-wall-on-arabia case.

And some people don’t care about relics. I don’t care about people who don’t care about relics. My balance suggestions and concerns should not reflect people who do not care about relics. If you do, that’s your problem. We do not need to buff mass monk strats or give monks auto-convert because bad players are bad. Ditto the Lithuanian, mythic five-relic bonus. End of story. It was a change to make bad players feel better.