Adding Romans to the base AoE2 is fine

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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Seeing a lot of negativity surrounding this new civ, to the point they added an edit in the steam page stating you can’t even play the Romans in ranked matches, for some reason? An edit that was made AFTER I bought the game btw, but I suppose that’s on me for pre-ordering.

The main argument is that: “the Romans don’t fit the AoE2 timeline”.

I am absolutely certain that’s not the case, here’s some reasons:

1 - AoE2 timeline begins just before the Dark Ages, presenting the fall of Rome.

2 - Both Huns and Goths who were prevalent during that time are already in the game, in case of the Huns they fell even before Rome did.

3 - Judging from their unique units (legionary and centurion already present in the campaign and editor) the game seems to depict the LATE Roman Empire, not the Rome of Scipio, Caesar or Trajan, but specifically Rome just before the Dark Ages, in short, Rome in the beginning of the AoE2 timeline.

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Moreover adding Rome has the benefit of rounding up all the main actors of the fall of Rome, Huns, Goths and now Romans, acting as prelude to AoE2 timeline, and having a cool connection with AoE1.

And sure, you can make the argument that Byzantines can already fill in that role, but imo they are different enough from the Western Romans, they seem to depict more the medieval Byzantium, they shouldn’t even be speaking Latin, imo Greek would be more suitable for them.

If the problem adding them in ranked matches is about game balance then it’s more understandable and they should try to fix it to make them eventually available, if it’s about them “not fitting in the timeline” I think it’s just silly, remove the Huns from ranked then in that case.

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Yea, it is OK. People complain too much.

The changes with AOE 1 on the other hand are quite dissapointing. No UU, 1 unique civ that is Vienatmese? Come on, I don’t cry usually but this is dissapointing.

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I can agree there, things seem a bit lackluster…
Imo they should make RoR a completely separate game (no need for base AoE2 to play), but that’s a different topic, hope RoR gets some more content in the future but seems unlikely.

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The decision to implement it into AOE2 is ok.

But if they want to remaster it then they have to complete it. Two incomplete remasters is too much.
Hopefully they will implement changes/patches to it like they did with AOE 2.

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I place the beginning of AOE2 with Constantine taking power by winning at the Milvian Bridge, with his vision of painting a Chi Rho on his shields. Indeed the Romans have had their place since the Huns were added.

But what really angers some is making the Romans only available with the ROR DLC, plus the half measure of not allowing them in ranked games. It feels like a cheap bait to sell the DLC to people who would otherwise have ignored it.

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I still have to see a logical argument against LATE Romans in aoe2 while if you know a little history you know that this is just natural if you wanna depict late antiquity. People in 2023 are still stuck to 476 as it was some life-changing year like we’re in primary school.
I don’t think the problem is ignorance but rather more about being very close minded or lacking imagination.
There’s also this prejudice I noticed people have here that if you like to have more European civs it means automatically you’re against Africa etc. I’d love to have more content in this game, from whatever part of the world is possible, as long as there are arguments. I even started considering Polynesia some time ago thanks to a very creative built I saw.
Still I’m ignorant about many cultures so I don’t pretend I can decide for them who’s in and who’s out. I just know that setting limits to creativity a priori is usually very close minded and sad, most of all when it’s about a game you like.

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Here’s where I think some of the anger is coming from. There is a group of people that constantly demand (often very niche or not actual civs) more European civs. But the ones that are always asked for are never Romans. Meanwhile as you said, there are people that think we have enough European civs. So Romans sit in an area where both sides get angry.

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But of course one can disagree with a civ being added. What is not right to me is to be against something as a dogma. Just give me an argument, you may even change my mind. I mean, it happens sometimes to me, I’m not that stubborn lol. For example if you rework byzantines making them represent better their early history I could even say you don’t need Romans in this game (even if such a rework would be very hard).
But using passive aggressive sarcasm, ignoring facts such as Attila being in this game since 25 years and Alaric from 10 and the best argument you have is because middle ages started with the fall of Rome… I mean, it’s simply not enough to prove your point anymore.

I’m personally very passionate about late antiquity but I’d love to see more mesoamerica and Africa. I don’t talk about it because I’m just too ignorant to say something meaningful in that regard but I loved dynasties of India and I’d be even more excited if someone says to me that there’s even more room for Indian civs. At the same time I would love a migration period dlc or more European civs.
I just don’t see why one thing excludes the other if not as a matter of priority but people who are against Romans are against it now and forever, not because of before we need more Africa etc. So even this argument fails…

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I understand those people, asking to add more niche civs (that would make sense in AoE2) instead of European civs, which we already see a lot, is perfectly fine, I just don’t understand why would people assume adding Romans impedes that.

People need to understand the themes of each dlc, RoR in this case, it’s main selling point is a port of AoE1 into AoE2, the new Roman civ in base AoE2 is a BONUS as far as I’m concerned, that makes sense in the theme of the dlc.
I mean, would anyone add a native American civ or Asian civ with RoR? Of course not, it would be random, Rome is the only one it makes sense here.

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AoE2 starts with the fall of Rome. I can see that having the civ which is just fallen into the game isnt really the issue for me. Nor it is that you can say Byz is already the Roman Empire. Based on the time frame i expect a civ with an early boost and bad end game (since they are just falling of), but if the civ design is like that is unknown to me. The peaks of every civs dont always match with their real peak in historry. So even if this expection is wrong, it doesnt really matter. The main point is of the DLC is adding AoE I to AoE II. To give AoE II also something, they added Romans. To me that is fine. I dont really know much about the AoE I civs. Maybe they could have added another one as well. Just 1 new AoE II civ feels a bit lacking. But on the other side, we got many AoE I civs as well.

What i dont like is having a civ in the base game that is excluded from ranked. Why? I dont see any good reason for this at all. Only thing i can imagine is that the make a civ that is too OP and they wont wanna balance the civ in any way. But if the civ is designed like this, then the design of the civ is just flawed. The devs should fix the flaw instead of excluding the civ from ranked.

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I agree with you, I prefer they nerf the civ and make it ranked, please.

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I think they’re testing the water first, whether this civ would be balanced or not without diluting the ranked ladder with this “recently released OP civ”.

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If that is the case then I agree with the approach, this definitely has been a problem before and I don’t mind if all future civ should be implemented this way.

The thing is they aren’t being exactly forthcoming with this (or really this whole dlc for that matter…).
At first they just said Rome would be in base AoE2 period, then, seemingly, after some negative feedback they added an edit stating that Rome wont be available in ranked?
And they don’t clarify if that’s indeed just a test or its permanent, one can assume either way.

Some more clarification would go a long way in my eyes.

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If that’s the case, it’s absolutely fine.

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The problem is most of the balance is made from the feedback of ranked games stats. Unranked only = much weaker feedback = cannot know how balanced it is = don’t know where to correct.

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I belong to neither group, tbh. Yes, I want Caucasus civs to be added, but I’m happy with whoever gets added, as long as they make sense in the time period and were culturally significant. Rome definitely meets this criteria.

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I never quite understood with the backlash, while I do agree those who said that Byzantines are Romans already (which is why I did proposed a name change of West Romans & East Romans), those who said that LATE Romans are beyond the AoE2 timeline forget that Franks, Celts, Persians, & to an extent Slavs existed during ancient times which is quite funny for me. Heck, I mean look at the Woad Raiders…

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Does this looks medieval to you?

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If someone made a campaign mod for AoE 1 someday this would fit right in

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Well to be fair they have a stronger argument there because civs like Franks and Slavs were prevalent way later into medieval times, and Persians can represent later empires as well, it’s just that whole argument comes tumbling down when you mention Huns and Goths and their respective campaigns.

Still yeah, I’m not big into Celtic history but that Woad Raider looks something out of the Gallic wars.

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Why do they need to do this this time? Other civs went straight to ranked. Your idea dont make sense to me.

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61… 39 more discussions left before we hit 100.

Lets bring more discussions about this DLC to get there soon, we need more discussions about the same subject.

Soon it would be 100, Thank you :blush:

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