Just look at how messy the unit is right now:
There is a tech that replaces existing longbows with rangers.
There is a tech that fully replaces longbows with rangers in the barracks.
There is a card that does the same (?).
(Forgive me if I remember the effects wrong. They are so overlapping and tweaked multiple times)
They share the same upgrade techs and cards with longbows.
Their upgrade cards get a rename and reskin with one of the above techs? or cards? (again, I cannot remember) but the effects do not change (while not appearing on the tooltips).
And one of the techs grants the veteran upgrade.
Seriously. This is so hard to understand. And among them there are a tech (which needs a card) and a card that do the same thing.
This overall seems to me like the developers are so afraid of adding a single new unit to a “well established civ” before the very radical recent reworks on European civs. So they took a series of small steps and it ends up being like this.
But now after the reworks, there are cards like the Scharnhorst reforms and Prinz chevaulegers that are both very simple and straightforward. Just clean up everything and copy that model.
Or simply make the ranger a regular age 4 skirmisher like the bersagiliere.
Then make the two ranger cards separate dedicated ones, so that players can choose to focus on either ranger or longbow.
The church techs can simply send rangers without the intricate unit swapping or replacement.
10 Likes
Credit to:
http://c.tieba.baidu.com/p/8209494114#/
Edit: most of these are not bugs, but very confusing.
For example, if you use the church tech but do not send the swapping card, the rangers you receive are still affected by siege archery and yeomanry, but the card tooltips do not change.
It is a complete mess right now, especially the convoluted card switching thing.
These are fairly straightforward, but the unit replacement method is still a horrible way to do things. It was done for the British because they were afraid to rock the boat, and it was done for Germany because they’re trying to cram 2 civs worth of content into one so not everything fits.
This is 100% the way to go. Right now the Ranger is a downgrade in most respects so it’s not even worth the switch. It shouldn’t be Rangers killing heavy infantry only and archaic Longbows outclassing them in every other matchup. There should be a niche for both of them to be used but with Rangers having an edge in most situations by the late game.
- Longbows should lose the Imperial Upgrade
- Rangers should start with 20 range
- Some of the cards could be altered:
Yeomen
Grants Longbowmen the skill promotion instead of giving them bonkers range
Baker Rifles
Rangers get +3 range and all other rifle infantry get +1 range
Roger’s Rangers
It would make sense if this still swapped out the Longbowmen shipment cards. Or alternatively it could enable them one age earlier.
8 Likes
I totally, totally agree with this. It does have a very unnatural RTS flow to how this unit is aquired.
It should be available only from the Industrial Age as mentioned, with Longbowmen still trainable.
I also like that the ranger cards are seperated with the emphasis on having to focus on which light infantry to focus rather than lock-us out.
I think your Roger’s Rangers suggestion is fantastic as well - makes complete sense for it allowing Fortress Age Rangers (historically and gameplay)
I really like that both are available but require you to choose whether to invest in the archaic but tried and test Longbowmen or save your shipments for pushing Rangers as your light infantry.
The positive on the side of this is a little bit of historical truth - The British were not terribly focused on light infantry tactics until later in the period, relying before then on foreign skirmishers or very few native skirmisher units. Later on they really took to light infantry, particularly the Rifles.
3 Likes
I agree, just allow rangers to be accessible in the 4th age like berserglieri and allow the musket/grenedier combat cards to also affect rangers since they are a little on the weaker side (dps) compared to longbows…
4 Likes
Good idea.
Maybe allow the non-team one ’ Musketeer/Grenadier Combat’ to change definition to British gunpowder/grenadier troops and call it Peninsular War.
4 Likes