I think the game might need some more anti cavalry options due to the archer nerf. Since the Franks are number 1. So, we might not need to nerf the franks if there are more anti cavalry options.
Maybe make the Spearman line even cheaper. 25 food, and 15 wood per unit. Down from 35 food, and 25 wood. So, 10 wood and 10 food cheaper. So you can spam more spearmen. That would make the Franks Knight spam a bit more easy to deal with. Forcing the Franks to make other units other than Knights and scouts.
Let’s say you are fighting Franks. You mass Spearmen, only to meet Swordsmen instead. Perhaps give swordmen additional bonus damage to Spearmen, so even more one-sided. To off-set the cheaper cost of spearmen
I think the biggest thing spears need is to have their upgrade cost to pikeman decreased, same with the research time.
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So perhaps Pikeman upgrade go from 215 food and 90 gold to something like 150 food, and 80 gold. To put that into context, the crossbowmen upgrade costs (before the update)125 food, and 75 gold.
I not sure about the Halberdier upgrade. I think buffing the cheapness on that may make them too strong. Cheaper Pikemen might be good enough. But if I must something like 100 food, and 200 gold cheaper. So they cost now 200 food, and 400 gold.
Instead of 300 food, and 600 gold.
the problem of spearmen is not that you “meet swordsmen”, but rather:
- relatively high upgrade cost (particularly for early Castle age eco), ideally you want Squires too.
- can only defend, Knight player can easily transition out of Knights and run in the meantime. Skirms in contrast can attack better and retake map control.
- 20 Pikemen vs like 12 Knights which is the engagement you are most likely to see is like an even-ish trade and considering Pikemen are supposed to be a hard counter, this isn’t impressive. Also with micro, Knight player can run back low HP Knights to heal, while you can’t generally heal Pikemen. Compare this encounter to how 10 Skirms perform vs 15 Crossbows, it’s night and day, you maybe lose 2 Skirms, 3 if Crossbow player micros hard.
It’s not even that Pikemen NEED buff, just people watch a 2700 ladder player like Hera, see them open Crossbow and go like “wtf Crossbow OP” when for 99% of the playerbase, including 2k-2.1k players, Knights are both scaling better long term and a more pop-efficient unit, and far easier to micro and to play. You see even 2k players, who are top of playerbase, failing to plug all gaps to all-in Knights and suffer irreversible damage in mid-Castle.
There is a reason 1400-1600 elo is full of Knight civ abusers, these people know how to macro A BIT, enough to do 1 TC 3 Stables into 2nd/3rd TC and win basically every game by spamming Franks/Berbers etc. Try to win as Crossbow civ in 1.6k elo, you need very good Feudal where you gain an advantage and ideally map control. You also need to go to Castle age first at all costs and ideally you need to break into his walls with your 1st group of 10 Crossbows because your unit becomes weaker and weaker as the Knights player gets +2 and siege, while his unit, stronger.
Like people hate on Crossbow but it takes skill to find damage with Crossbows vs a Knights civ before they get out mass Knights.
Oh yeah Pikeman costing 40 res suggestion from the OP, no ty, that would catapult us into a Pike Siege meta, not to mention civs like Goths or Aztecs, near unstoppable at that point.
In my opinion, best way to nerf Crossbows was to either increase production time, or reduce upgrade time of Elite Skirm to help a player who is 2nd to Castle and teched into Skirms a bit more. Nerfing Crossbow cost-wise is rly dumb given how hard Knights counter Archer-line already. Imp nerf is even dumber, who even complained about fast Imp by Archer civs? That’s like the whole design of an Archer civ, kill you with timing. It’s not like Arbalest can compete once Knights have +4 anyway, now Archer player will have to do early Halberdier tech while Knight player can stick to a 1-unit spam and that’s unfair.
2 Likes
That’d just nerf other cavalry civs, not to mention scout rush is already pretty underwhelming with spears being so good in feudal
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Someone made a proposal for adding anti-cav bonus damage to TCs. (sorry I don’t remember who and can’t fint the thread)
I’m not a fan of that cause I think it would make it too easy to protect your expansion. You want TCs there for producing vills anyways.
But I think anti-cav bonus damage for towers could actually work.
It’s maybe not the most elegant solution for a complex problem, but I see it working.
Pretty sure it was coolios9876.
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Seems you are right. He even mentioned Towers there already.
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