A list of ideas for balance and creativity in the game

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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Important questions for the game

Just a summary, to discuss:

  • Pathing
  • Return of Rome is dead
  • What type of DLC do we want in the future?
  • What about changes to the UI?

Balance
General:

  • Elite Steppe Lancer does not see any play. → The upgrade cost is crazy given the gold cost, prohibitive in the late game. Perhaps the unit itself could use a small buff, but I would start with decreasing the upgrade cost to 700f, 250 g.

  • Water balance: I cannot claim to have a good idea without changing the whole game. However, two broken very late effects need to be addressed: (i) Feitorias are absolutely unfair; (ii) Four civs (Mesos and Cumans) don’t get any long range siege ship. To address the latter, I would suggest just giving Cumans Cannon Galleon, in spite of how historically inaccurate it is, and to give Mesoamerican civilisations an alternative, on the same model as the Dromon. It would necessarily be historical fiction…

  • Towers: are probably at the right spot in Feudal Age, but fall off afterwards. Here is an attempt of a solution: Arrowslits available in the Castle Age, cost reduced to 150f, 150w. After researching Arrowslits, a new tech would be available for some selected civs in the Imperial Age: Outpost Network (250w, 100s). Effect: Reduces the cost of Towers to 85 stone, 10 wood (from 125s, 35w).

Per civilisation:

  • Bulgarians: TC stone discount: -50% → -75%, for TC at 25 stone. Blacksmith cost 50 wood.
  • Byzantines: Absolutely not needed for balance reasons, but could it make sense to give them the Legionary? I doubt they would become broken simply because of their access to this unit.
  • Franks: Bearded axe should be part of the Elite Axeman upgrade. The new Castle UT should be used to make the civ feel more unique.
  • Georgians: Economic boost granted by fortified churches reduced to +7%. Monaspa +10 g (to 60f, 55g). Not elite: speed reduced to 1.35. Elite: melee armour reduced to 4.
  • Hindustanis: are too powerful in my opinion. Instead of touching again at the food bonus, I would touch at the late game, and notably Shatagani…
  • Italians: -25% cost of Gunpowder Units (from -20%). The Elite upgrade of the Genoese Crossbowman is way too expensive for what it yields: 900f, 750g → 700f, 650g. Non-elite could also afford to lose 1 melee armour.
  • Khmer: lose access to Hussar.
  • Portuguese: Feitorias are silly and I have ranted about them many times. They don’t belong in the main game and should belong to the scenario editor.
  • Sicilians: the one-off effect of First Crusade is still not the best, but I suppose it is what it is. The balance of the civ is otherwise difficult. Devs have made Donjons more attractive, and rightfully so. Sicilians probably need another tool in the box though. I think there are two ways to go, beyond the ‘Fortifications’ identity, which will always have limited effects on balance: (i) make their archers more viable (giving Thumb Ring or the last armour upgrade), or (ii) double down on the ‘hard to kill’ units identity. The latter is my favourite, and could be achieved either by re-designing First Crusade, or by extending the effect of Hauberk to other units (e.g. Infantry).
  • Vikings: feel unfairly weak in the very late game. I’m unsure of what can be done. Does anyone want to suggest ideas? Perhaps Rams could cost half the gold after researching the UT, to allow them to train more Archers and Beserks? They suffer both from quite weak ‘shock, elite’ units (Paladin, Elephants, etc.) and weak trash units.

Fun ideas

  • Mesoamerican Imperial UT affects also Xolotl Warrior.
  • Byzantines allied to Vikings can upgrade their two-handed swordsmen into Varangian Guards instead.
  • Introduce new siege unit: Mantlet. It uses the same mechanic as Hussite Wagon, and has very high pierce armour. It absorbs 90% of the pierce damage inflicted to units behind it. Very useful to protect infantry from archers. This could only be a scenario editor unit.

Future DLC

  • Campaign DLC like V&V are not necessarily a bad idea… as long as they are decently priced given the content. E.g. for 18 scenarios (3 campaigns of 6 scenarios for instance) completely new, I think 5 euros to be fair.
  • New civilisations are always possible, though it becomes incresingly difficult to be original and to keep the classic AoE II flavour at this point. An option would be to focus on the great invasions of late Antiquity, e.g. introducing the Vandals. It could be an occasion to bring minor changes to the Goths, the Franks, the Celts or even the Huns. Many campaigns including these civilisations and the Romans are possible.
  • New game mods could also be introduced. It depends how far the devs would want to go, but for instance I have always liked the possibility of modding AoE II in Lord of the Rings. Using mods introducing weather condition, seasons, or the passage of time in general can also be interesting. Of course they should not step on the main game.

Campaigns

  • Return of Rome should include all the original campaigns.
  • Celts and Romans still don’t have their own campaign. Except for the historical battles, Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Magyars, Slavs, Turks, Vikings and Mayans still don’t really have their own campaign. A big DLC with a six-scenarios campaign for each of these civs would make sense (and atone for V&V, hopefully).
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The problem of Georgians is their flawless Dark age with their free mule cart, just give them -50 wood at the start, as for Monaspa, the right way to nerf them is to make them wayy worse when unmassed (Like reducing their ROF from 1.8 to 2.2, but when massed goues back to 1.8).

Hindustanis are in a right spot now, they are only at their strongest on open maps, if Shatagni is the problem then just increase the cost a bit, but they are fine.

No you are simply buffing them in the late game where they are already very good, they need help for their earlier and slow game.

I would rather remove Blast furnace but buff Tusks Swords from +3 attack to +5 Attack, in this way their Battle Elephants are the same (if anything buffed as you no longer pay for blast furnace just the UT) but their Hussars, Cavaliers and infantry are weaker in Imperial (They are already lacking Plate Mail Armor, Supplies, Gambesons and Squires, -2 attack won’t change anything), other than Khmer probably don’t need more nerfs.

Bohemians already have this bonus.

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What I would do to help Italians is replace their University tech discount bonus with an Archery Range one, move the effect of Silk Road to a team bonus, and replace it with a new tech, Renaissance, which reduces the cost of University techs by 50% and unlocks the Condottiero for allies.

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Xbow and Arbalest upgrades were increased for a reason, such idnscount combined with cheaper age ups will be too strong for low eco plays, and trust me, no one will invest into a castle and a UT to simply get cheaper university techs, and the idea of Condos is to counter gunpowder units, for that reason they are available in Imperial.

I suggest this once more, remove Ring Archer Armor, Make Blacksmith Archer Armor upgrades to give double effect to ranged units, Italians will still have their slower eco, but for prolongued feudal/castle age, they gain a clear advantage over other archer civs, and as well reinforcing the identity of armored archers, while making easier to transition into Genoese crossbows.

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Well, you wanted Italians that were good in the midgame.

Renaissance would be available in the Imperial Age.

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33% discount on archery range techs is just barely revert back to pre-nerf level. I thought the reason was that non-archer civ went with xbow too often. But italians is an archer civs.

Maybe arbalest and condo -20% pop space instead. Condo no need to be a shared unit.

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Maybe we can buff more civs in water, like Japanese, koreans, malay etc.

I remember Arrowslits was originally available in castle age. But it was moved to imp as it was a very effective upgrade in castle age for some civs with tower boni. Arrowslits may need to be only available to guard towers and Keeps only. This is probably a big Sicilian buff, which Devs only want to nerf them.

Vikings has good powerspike tho. Maybe Elite Berserkers received some minor buff, like +1 PA.

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This name is confusing, as it does not affect the Outpost.
Beyond that, I have reservations about lowering the cost to attract people to use it. People may not even plan to use the towers, so they won’t even research the Guard Tower upgrade and Arrowslits, let alone the next technology of Arrowslits. On the other hand, certain civs like the Japanese and Koreans who use towers in the late game don’t need to reduce the cost of the towers.

I would like to keep the Bearded Axe but make it allow the Militia line units to have a charge bar for throwing axes. That could also feel unique.

That’s their most iconic identity, so it won’t be removed.
But we can make them have diminishing marginal benefits or increasing marginal costs as the quantity increases, so the more existing Feitoria there are, the more expensive it is to build a new one, and the lower average generating rate per Feitoria. For more, increase the base cost of Feitoria or even lock access to it behind an UT.

I thought where they were really weak in the late game was against large numbers of Arbalesters. They currently rely on Onagers for this. Maybe removing Siege Engineers in exchange for giving Siege Onager upgrade would be helpful.

Why? So how about making the Persians have to ally with an Indian civ to be able to train War Elephants?
The Varangians are already represented as Viking AI allies in the Byzantine campaign. I don’t think there’s a lack of representation for them in the game.
While I’m still not really opposed to have more unique upgrades, I don’t like the need to depend on allies.

Sounds fine.

Double armor effect is OP in the Castle age. No one can defeat your archers with archers.

Might as well give them free armors and give the Koreans a new one. This also fits with the armored archer theme and makes for an even easier transition to the Genoese Crossbowmen.

Oh no… Locking Condo behind UT would seriously damage its niche. Many times they are used not against gunpowder, but as sudden raiders in the Imperial age that can be used directly without waiting for upgrades.

Personally I’d like to rename Silk Road, to let it simply affect allies like Kasbah, and to give it a small secondary effect that is beneficial to 1v1 games.

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Condos would still be available to the Italians instantly in Imperial Age, they would just need to research Renaissance for allies to train them.

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Its niche does be seriously damaged… for the allies.

The new Korean bonus could be University technologies cost no wood.
Although it is what I originally suggested for the Bulgarians, it would also fit the Koreans using archers and siege weapons. Focusing on education is also consistent with Korean history, such like the Gukhak.

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Well even if you get pavise in castle age opposing xbow will need 9 shots, Vietnamese also win archer fights with the same 9 shots and that is already a civ bonus that affects instantly, with 4 PA, it is 12 hits, and that is after researching the armor techs, and players often research the attack upgrades and ballistics in archer wars before armor (even more for Italians as Ballistics costs 33% less), also, Italians haven’t any eco bonus to make it overpowered at high level.

For people that complain that Genoese crossbows aren’t impressive, that change gives them motivation to use them in castle age.

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A generic crossbowman with the second armor can withstand 7 shots from a generic crossbowman.
A Vietnamese crossbowman with the second armor can withstand 9 shots from a generic crossbowman, which is two more.
A crossbowman with the second armor and the double effect bonus can withstand 12 shots from the generic crossbowman, which is even three more than the Vietnamese, which is really OP even without economy bonus. Not to mention it still have a chance to get Pavise, which can make it withstand 18 shots.

When people see a bonus that clearly state the benefits of armor, people become more willing to actively engage with it, which is the psychology. Even if the Ballistics has a priority, it doesn’t change the fact that the double armor is OP for archers in the Castle age. I even think people would give armor a higher priority than Ballistics, which they can research the latter cheaper anyway.

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Why more armor gives motivation to use GC instead of xbow？

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Maybe the double archer armour bonus could go to a civ that do not upgrade archers to crossbows…

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Something with good new content (something that doesn’t already exist as a custom mod). New non-infantry civs, full length campaigns, game mode etc.

Unique units can have a change of skin for their elite version to visually distinguish.

Too low on gold. Could be a change specific to Cumans.

The whole water tech tree needs a rework and a DLC of its own. Until then these changes are unnecessary. No one will pick Cumans on a water map and play water.

Could be interesting.

Blacksmith is a duplicate of Bohemians. TC stone discount is fine.

No. They won’t be broken, but its still unnecessary to give a niche buff to a civ which is already extremely versatile.

Fine with buffing axemen but should come with a nerf to the civ elsewhere. Maybe UT gives the OG 25% castle discount. (I think this was discussed in a different thread)

Unnecessary. ~50% winrate at higher elos overall since their buff, 1 win to 6 losses in NAC5, 1 win to 5 losses in HC5. Decent but very average and niche to passive open maps as of now.

Monaspa nerfs are totally unnecessary. The unit is strictly inferior to Leiti. Plenty of cav unique units like Keshiks, Coustillier are priced around that range. Armor is just a trade-off for low hp against melee units without an anti-cavalry bonus damage. Any perception of that unit being overpowered is merely an outcome of strong military advantage on scouts and knights early on in the game. Just remove the hp regen on scout line, change it to 10% fixed from castle age and the civ will be fine as they are.

As far as economy goes, the economic boost radius can be reduced from 10 to 8 ### not %. A single church covers at max about 20 vills and Georgian player has to keep investing in multiple churches to benefit and thats a non-trivial decision.

Huge nerf for a civ with <45% winrate in games longer than 45 min across all elo brackets. Also farming rate is less than 4% higher after handcart. So a wrong nerf to the civ.

Buffs where they are good already. Maybe feudal and castle age are 20% cheaper but imp is full price.

They can scale down with the number of feitorias used or the resource generation could decay over time.

They need an eco bonus or Donjons should get more resistance to bonus damage from villagers.

That’s by design. Wheelbarrow and handcart being free is too powerful and meant to compensate for it. Maybe chieftains cost can be lowered a bit.

gimmick

Inconsistent with team bonus behavior.