Age of Infantry/Elephants/Camels

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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This is dump so i can refer to it, when it all comes true, instead of having to fish out individual posts (im just kidding, or am I):

LS onwards base speed from 0.9 to 0.95. MA from 1 to 2. LS are slightly easier to manoeuvre, significantly better vs trash (easier to chase down skirms 1.05 vs 0.96 speed, resist low melee atks even better), slightly better vs knights(which are strategically still a better unit due to speed, and relatively low food cost in castle age), but still hard countered by their intended counters (xbow/CA) Currently the dynamic between trash is so bad, that FU 2HS, lose to FU Hussar in pitched battles, especially when considering reinforcement rates, and the ability of the Hussars to choose the fight.

Battle Ele onwards base speed from 0.85 to 0.9. Cost from 120/70 to 100/85. BE are better able to be manoeuvred, and easier to train earlier, but harder to mass later.

Camel riders only. Bonus atk vs cav from +9 to +10. Camels will always kill generic knights in max10 hits, regardless of atk upgrades. Camels will be a better support unit for existing offensive lines, instead of relying as much on a tech race to match opposing knight tech

Obviously civs like gurj and hindus needs to be toned down anyway, so their nerfs would be in conjunction with these universal buffs.

Civs like Malians would need to be considered, potentially capping PA at +2. But even then Malian champs would still be countered by existing counters.

Camels still die to the same s**t, they’re just slightly less punishing as a support unit, nothing changes for H Camels, because they’re already good.

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+Eagle
+SL
+EA
+Armored Ele and Siege Ele

I was thinking something lately. Is it okay if we introduce “Regional Unit” armor class and give Militia line bonus attack to this armor class?

Battle Elephant and EA will get +30 anti-elephant armor but -10 “Regional Unit” armor, so they won’t be countered by spears that hard but will be countered by Militia line instead. EA in addition, gets +3 attack bonus vs spearman like other archer units.

Similarly Spears attack bonus vs Camel can be reduced slightly so that Camel survives one more hit. But Militia line trades even better.

Standard and Elite SL gets +3 and +5 attack bonus vs spearman line but takes huge damage from Militia line. Not the best idea to fix SL tbh.

Armored Elephants get +50 armor on “Regional Unit” armor so they stay the same.

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This feels like something I would want to be against, because it’s such a random grouping. “What I specialize in? Oh, you know, killing specific types of soldiers that occur in just enough places to be reasonably common.” Yet strangely enough game balance wise it would probablly kind of work.

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I just wanted to address Militia line, Elephant, and SL all at once.

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A bit off topic but it is a bit related to this post. I will open another thread if it is not the case.

Why is champion suppose to counter Hussar? Someone say because champion counter trash unit. So then why champion suppose to counter trash unit? Late game Hussar with a little bit micro like stand ground attack move win champion easily and not to mention you can also leash unit using one or two Hussar with its speed. For some civ their Hussar even beat Champion 1v1

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imo champion is supposed to be a moderate unit that are good againist building by its bonus damage. And not too bad againist all other unit because of its relatively good stat / cost ratio. Therefore, if you rush for 2HS in early imp age, you want to crash your opponent by killing his building. And it make sense that Hussar, a unit without bonus damage on building, statwise can beat 2HS.

Yes champion kill Halberdier and Skirmisher. But it does not mean it mean to counter Hussar.

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I like the Armor increase for the militia line. I think this could really them much more interesting in the lategame indeed.

The needed changes to BE and Camels are a bit more complex though. I don’t think you can solve all the issues with these units so easily.

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Champions generally win pretty convincingly vs standard Hussars. Similarly you can just say ‘with some micro’ you win.
Poles have trample damage on their Winged Hussar, so it doesn’t surprise me the Hussar would win that battle.

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Since they don’t take bonus damage from any trash unit, they should be good against non-gold unit.

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Agree on MA not on speed. They should be reasonably countered by archer and seige. Movement speed is not a good way to buff

100% agree on that.

Seems OK

Because Hussar is better than Champion in almost every aspects, especially against archer/seige, mass hussar counter ranged unit. Better resistant to arrow means it is perfect unit to raid.
Even Hussar beat champion/2HS in 1v1 direct fight, why there is reason left to train 2HS/Champion over Hussar? Current late game with gold limiting situation is just spam hussar forever with 80 farms. No other unit/strategies are viable. Make champion more vaiable in that scenario can make the dynamics of late game not too oriented to hussar which is ugly I think.

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Sorry but no. Poles Winged Hussar just beat champion 1v1 without any support and trample damage.

This one is weird. They are good against non-gold unit becauase non-gold unit is used to be weak in terms of stat and counter some kind of unit, like ski counter pike, and pike counter cav. But Hussar do not counter standard archer/infantry/cav unit, and also Hussar don’t have weak stat.

I agree Hussar is too good against archer and it may becauase the late game archer is just too weak. It make sense that foot archer fall off after early imp but i think it is weird that Hussar can somehow act like a counter to HCA and even Mangudai.

For 2HS / Champion they have a huge bonus on building. In imp you need to choose whether

  1. go 2HS/ champion if you want to erase their base asap, and you win defensive unit like pike and ski
  2. go Husser if you want to raid / focus on killing the vill + need produce and upgrade seige to erase base. and you will be countered by defensive unit like pike, very hard

imo, 2HS / Champion and Hussar serve different role.

For the super late game gold run out situation, I understand and I think it is the reason why peope hate Hussar so hard and I have no idea how to deal with it although I don’t think making champion counter Hussar is reasonable. And as a raiding unit, Hussar fit its role so much that they move fast and resist arrow with PA 2+4. Maybe making imp TC / tower have bonus againist Hussar line so that Hussar can still good in raiding standalone mine camp vill but they no longer able to eat TC easliy.

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Universal techs to allow 10 swordsmen garrison back inside a barrack. They can ambush the enemies and better protect the base, or temporarily retreat and wait for reinforcement.

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I think militia need bonus vs scout armor and Eagles and scout given the same armor. Maybe just give feudal scout a +2 armor class if the bonus from MAA would be too much (i don’t think so since scouts have speed and MAA are still counteres by archers the same but still
) So that THS and Champion have a juici bonus vs scout line to actually counter them

Also, reduce cost of upgrades for THS and Champion. Atm is never worth the cost to transition into militia in late game since it costs 2k+ res, and hussar are cheaper and better

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Yes it is hussar that makes the difference. And militia-line was not scaled properly in AOC. After 20 years, with DE, devs are putting more focus on militia line.

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Building bonus damage doesn’t impactful if your military can’t win enemy’s military at first place. At least Rams are resistant against ranged unit but Champion’s are not. However, Hussar can win cost-effectively pretty much everything in late game except halb and always choose fight. They need counter unit other than halb for especially civ doesn’t access to them.

I think they are very good at raiding is just fine. Giving bonus against them for defensive building is just weird. Maybe just adding university tech to gaining extra garrison space for tower? Because in late game it is very difficult to defend all part of economy and tower with only 5 garrison space has very little meaning for their stone cost.

The problem of hussar is they are too good against every units except their direct counter. Militia line need bonus damage against them. Also thinking of giving extra bonus damage vs them for pike/halb (Like elephant receive extra bonus damage vs them). Even pike are surprisingly not really hard counter hussar, more of soft counter that it makes civ without halb painful to deal with hussar.

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What about Teutons and Bulgarians? They don’t need more MA. Also Infantries that are good against melee like Japanese, Aztecs, Burmese, Dravidians don’t need more MA. Even Malians shouldn’t get better melee performance as they are one of the best militia line in the game.

This is why I’m not a big fan of buffing militia line further. Reduce THS and Champion upgrade cost and time, and maybe then we can add more generic techs in Barracks for Militia line - extra speed, or MA, or PA, or combination of them.

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But you hardly see them. Even teutons with the extra MA are countered by almost exactly the same things as garland champs.

But what we do see is LS getting stomped by knights, because their eco efficiency is simply so poor at that stage. Even teuton or Japanese LS.

It’s ok if xbows still counter these things as effectively (keeping PA) because at least it forces a transition from the cavalry player

Cavalry is the most dominant unit in the game. How do we curb that, without making archers OP(2nd most dominant unit) because when(if) we buff pikes, we also buff xbows, because pikes are semi useless by themselves, so they are protecting something. So any buff to pikes is a buff to whatever they’re protecting

Conversely LS are not good at protecting anything, because their speed is too low, and so is their dps. They’re assault units, which die to everything (economically)

And adding another tech doesnt help them, because they’re already a very expensive unit to tech into for what you’re getting . Would we even see more LS in late castle If we add a tech that adds 1/1 armour?

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The exact same things will still counter them in a straight fight. That increase to speed makes generic LS 0.01 faster than Celt LS. Are Celt LS not countered by archers or siege?

The point is to improve their strategic potential, because the speed means more over greater distances. The slow speed of a ram means less when you have a proxy siege works, compared to moving a ram all the way from your base.

Yes the speed helps in a fight, that’s part of the point. But 0.05 isn’t enough that it changes the counters. Lith pikes are A greater difference of .11 faster than generic, are they Not countered by the same things?

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Partly because it doesn’t counter much, while being countered by so much.

Trash were designed to counter specific things, so it’s not necessarily that champs should counter hussars, it’s more that Hussars should absolutely NOT counter champs.

Even with this change hussars will still be vastly better due to the utility they bring, on top of the amount of things they counter (including power units)

Always supported this as well. Marginally better MAA in feudal Vs cav civs. And a slight buff in castle age (you aren’t really going to try fight LC with LS very often anyway) and maybe the largest impact in imperial.

I think it could be done in conjunction with any other buffs (whether it’s champ discount or MA increase) because there shouldn’t exist a scenario where scout line is considered a counter to LS line.

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Fuedal maa dont need buffs imo. Its already the strongest opener in the game.

Fully support ls onwards getting bonus vs scouts.

Fully support cheaper/faster 2hs and champs

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Cancels each other out conveniently. I forgot MAA only get +2 v eagles

So effectively you get the same thing anyway (bonus from LS onwards)

We’ll more than likely get this, but still won’t see Much more LS play in castle age(even if their long term viability is improved with the imperial buff), so while we see more 2hs and champs in the late game in 1v1, I don’t see TGs being affected too much either.

Definitely more infantry play in general (more HC in return, and possibly more jags as well) but I don’t think it will have a big effect on how most people play. Would be happy either way. Still a step in the right direction, like the incremental HC buffs we had