Disclaimer:
I like AoE4 and I think it’s going to be a very good game, it is even likely to become my favourite AoE game.
But I think all Civilisations are flawed, all of them have some elements that makes them feel “wrong”.
Rus
Warrior Monks are not really based on history. Monks in the East weren’t all to different to the West.
They have the best Bombards in the game, why?
Holy Roman Empire
Why do they have the worst Knights in the game?
Why are Landsknecht lightly armoured, makes no sense. They also shouldn’t be available in Castle Age.
Why do they not have Arquebus if they have Culverins and Landsknecht?
Chinese
Buildings don’t really fit. Kinda looks like Chinatown.
Some units use European weapons like spearman (might be a bug) or crossbows. (Also applies to other civilsations to some degree)
Chinese were known for using crossbows in great numbers since ancient times, in AoE4 they aren’t really special
China never used Bombards. Maybe some mortar unit would be better.
Palace Guard uses a Guandao. That’s not a weapon of war. But to some degree most MAA are unrealistically equipped.
English
Why do the Man at Arms look like Castle Age units in Dark and Feudal Age. Give them Round and kite Shields to make the updates more visible. Would also look better tbh.
Why are their knights the weakest in the game (less dramatic than the HRE problem but still)
Man At Arms should be unique to them an have a different name for others.
Delhi Sultanate
Their only unique units are Elephants?
They were early adopters of the Arquebus in relatively large scale and still used match locks much longer than the West. They shouldn’t have hand cannons either.
Mongols
It is strange that their Lancers are the same as European knights. They should be a unique unit like Step Lancers in AoE2.
Abbasid Dynasty
To big fucus on Camels. The units themselves are fine but there are to many bonuses tied to them.
No bonus for their famous light cavalry (Maybe Mamluk as Horseman or Lancer replacement?)
They shouldn’t have crossbows. In reality they barely used them and even called them “Frankish bows”. It’s not like they don’t have good ways to deal with knights and MAA already.
Their name should be Califate. This one is pretty obvious.
French
Their MAA despite being in full plate armour is the weakest in the game
Why do they have ships with cannons in Castle Age?
Generally
Knight and Lancer should be two different units. Knight heavier, a bit slower and more expansive. Lancer a bit cheaper and faster (between Knight and Horseman speed). Both with the same attack damage.
MAA (best not named MAA) should be different too. Most none Western Europeans should have a more place guard like unit.
Don’t repeat the mistake of AoE2 and make all civilisations Europeans with a few exotic elements mixed in.
I probably forgot a few things.
The civilisations are still better than nearly all AoE2 or AoE3 civilisations in my opinion. A lot less silly stereotypes and more units fulfil more realistic purposes like camels scare cavalry instead of having bonus damage against them.
But I think it could be nearly perfect with a view little changes.
I also ignored balance but I think most of those things could be changed while still keeping the game balanced.
China invented the crossbow so I would say that is fine if they have crossbows or crossbow-like units. They really should have something potent in relation to it. Im just upset that the most iconic 14th/15th century European weapon (Pollaxe) is not in the game. Hopefully it will be added later.
My point with the crossbow was that China should have Age 2 Crossbows and maybe some unique technologies like Volley fire that gives them a bonus against cavalry.
I agree with the poleaxe. That should have been the MAA weapon!
Stronger than Chinese 50 percent heath boost? I mean Chinese didn’t even have bombards unlike Russians. So yeah some civ units/bonuses choices are weird.
Yeah I know its just that giving a nation a unit which they just didn’t have is another type of wrong than just making real one stronger than it should have been.
The Swede Frederick Coyett was talking about this weapon when he described Zheng Chenggong’s troops wielding “with both hands a formidable battle-sword fixed to a stick half the length of a man”.“Those with the sword-sticks—called soapknives by the Hollanders—render the same service as our lancers in preventing all breaking through of the enemy, and in this way establishing perfect order in the ranks ; but when the enemy has been thrown into disorder, the Sword-bearers follow this up with fearful massacre amongst the fugitives.”
Horse archers should deal 100% damage since they are ranged or not hitting units above their height with sword or spear etc.
For melee cavalry, I understand that the camels are tall so for the horsemen it is hard to hit targets that are higher so I think that is a reasonable bonus for the camels.
The issue is that it gives the bonus to the unit from all types of cavalry units (both melee and ranged).
The bonus come from the fact than horses was afraid by camels, i suppose it’s pretty “euro” centered as an horse rised next to camels shoudn’t be afraid (and of course it never happend in europe ^^).
As a Mongolian, the camels bite like hell and are known and written in history books. The Arabian or African camels are really tall especially when to comes to riders compare to the Mongolian Camel.
The camel riders would deal more damage bcse the force is going up and down so it adds more dmg, for the melee cavalry, the force is going up, which means they are losing energy on the way.
The Camels usually bite a horse’s head or neck and have the potential to kill it with a single bite man. That is why horses are afraid of Camels.
But if you put the horse a little bit far away, they are pretty calm and do live together with a little bit of space in between.
