The Scythians are too early for the game. However, the Sarmatians, and therefore Alans, are descended from the Scythians.
I think there were still Roxolani people in the early periods of the game, though, and they would also be covered by Alans. It may also work for the Saka.
They’re literally in the Attila campaign.
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Those are different Scythians, as the ones the Sarmatians and Alans are descended from ended in the 3rd century B.C.
Either that, or the original devs just completely made something up.
The game engine has no room for more civs, they need to move the game to another engine with more capacity but given its time this game has got stuck with the same player base for like 3 years, in other words this game is lo longer a success and it ain’t the classic game anymore, look how bad the path finding is among other several bugs.
Now watch out at the red bull event, they cut aoe2 price, showtime and players in order to promote AOM despite no other aoe game has nearly the same viewers as aoe2 and aom is no exception.
Microsoft has been shuting down game studios like crazy it wouldn’t be a surprise for them to move on after aom release and focus on the blizard remakes.
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Incorrect. That “maximum civ” thing was a misunderstanding.
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No need to add in a civ called “Mamelukes” because that’s the name of a unique unit of the Saracens. Siamese would be a good idea to add. It would also be a good idea to add in the Kurds, which would most certainly be another ME civ. There’s no need for an architecture set called “Chinese” because the current East Asian architecture set is supposed to represent the architecture of East Asian civs and Vietnamese.
I mean, if someone played the William Wallace campaign without knowing how he ended up, you’d hink the Scots won
In anyway, I think that Alans would represent Scythians better than Mongols in the Attila campaign
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I’ve been saying that the game is dying.
2019-2022 were the years of Age of Empires 2.
When DE came out in 2019, they made 4 new civs, new campaigns and they reworked old civs and campaigns. There was so much content to play. They released a balance patch every month to shake the meta (Khmer, Vietnamese buff etc.). I was always excited to see which weak civ got buffed. Custom games were so fun too.
They released their first DLC in 2021 with civs that no one asked for, but we were still excited and the campaigns turned out great. Then they made another DLC that year which was much better. Then Dynasties of India in early 2022 which was the best DLC in DE. So many cool balance changes happened meanwhile. Then the game went downhill shortly after.
I thought they started caring about the game again in 2023, when they made a giant balance patch. That patch was so great, but I was wrong. They did nothing for months until fall when they released their 4th DLC. The civs were nice, but they lowered the quality compared to other DLC-s and also increased the price.
This year has been so bad for AOE2. They made a DLC with workshop maps for 15$ which was their dirties move yet. They haven’t balanced the game for months and pathing is worse than ever. They even ignore simple community requests such as changing the Persian architecture.
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They sent out that survey a few weeks ago, maybe they are analyzing the responses from that to determine what direction to go.
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Game isn’t dying. We had 3 DLCs in the past 14 months. Lots of people specifically wanted a DLC without new civs and that’s why they experimented with V&V.
What are you talking about? 2023 had the most impactful set of balance changes and they happened so often. Vietnamese, Koreans, Slavs and a bunch of other civs which were very weak got buffed and became usable. Bonuses on 1st town center for Nomad got removed which was a huge positive change for Nomad tg. Changes to monks, drop-off feature, so many.
Mountain Royals was more expensive but it was definitely not worse than DOI. Introduced new concepts like Mule cart, fortified churches apart from the usual unique units. So I’d not consider that bad or going downhill either. The way they let people try the new civs for 2 weeks through PUP before the release was also a great positive change.
There’s mixed opinions about how often people want massive balance changes. I’d prefer every quarter but there are also a lot of people who don’t want it often. And for quite sometime we’ve complained about releasing a patch without proper testing, maybe they’re changing internal process and actually testing out the changes properly this time.
The only real negative from everything you’ve mentioned is probably not changing the Persian architecture. I haven’t followed that thread, so I don’t know if there are any counter arguments to it but maybe that’s the only thing they could have done but didn’t. Just because there’s no DLC release or announcements every 2 months, it doesn’t mean the game is dying. There are new eSports teams entering the scene, new sponsors from the Chinese community, Redbull is back. How can you just blindly say the game is dying?
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A small esport team that so far has got only 3 members and one very small caster 
A new sponsor? that sponsor isn’t new, he has been sponsoring membos events, he just changed the name but its the same guy who got millionaire on china by selling mask during covid 
A redbull with 8 players on the main event (from 16) even the qualifiers have only now 2 winners outside the qualified, ao2 will have less time on screen, not to mention they invited viper who hasn’t won anything relevant in years and now his attention is full on his family, meanwhile the best player around has to qualify and knock out players that could have won a spot on the main event facing any other player, sorry man but this redbull ain’t special anymore.
The game isn’t dying in terms of player base but it ain’t growing either, stagnation isn’t something to be proud considering all the support and exposition it has got from microsoft and redbull.
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The game is not stagnant in terms of player base, as evidenced by resurgence of new players in tournaments.
It is objectively worse with less civilizations and more recycled content WITH a higher price.
-Mountain Royals has less content, less quality and costs more money than other DLC-s, it is a downgrade.
-Return of Rome was a cashgrab that tried to cater for the Vietnamese and casuals but failed.
-Victors of Vanquished were another cashgrab with recycled content from workshop for an outrageous price. No one wanted content recycled from free workshop that costs money.
The pathing is worse than ever, unlikely
It is the same Chinese, they organize a tournament or two every year. Redbull is back and but smaller, there are way less tournaments now than before. Don’t pretend e-sports scene is growing. Most of the orgs are noname. There are less people playing aoe2 full than time than before.
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what are you expecting? 50+ sponsors, 200+ events, redbull with 512 players and several thousand dollars prize even for those eliminated in the first round? Not going to happen. Realistically 1 or 2 esports teams, some new found pro players like Lewis, Guki, newly emerging top-20 like Sebastian, Mihai and at least 1 event with external sponsorship from an entity other than Microsoft, is what we can get.
All Membtv events in DE are fully sponsored by Microsoft. The Chinese person might have just supported his production costs. Whoever it is, he never did a 5 digit prize pool event before Shenaixie cup. There is also a specific reddit post about the sudden growth of aoe 2 amongst Chinese community through Douyin or something. Just search for reddit aoe 2 vivi and you’ll find that post.
The hype/growth between 2019-2022 were fueled by the release of DE and the covid-19 pandemic. Its natural for those numbers to decline after 2022. I’m not saying the current situation is something to be proud of but its not indicative of the game dying either.
More civs doesn’t mean better. DOI is effectively just Gurjaras. Other 2 have poorly designed tech tree, almost nothing unique, mediocre bonuses and should have just been put together as one meaningful civ. Mountain royals introduced new things and its not recycled content. There was no mule cart or churches, Monaspa and warrior priests are new concepts. Only recycled content in Mountain royals is composite bowman.
Its not. Its the 2nd best DLC after Dawn of the Dukes imo. Dawn of the Dukes should have also been sold at a higher cost, like 15 or 20$ for its quality. So not a downgrade but a different marketing or revenue generating strategy.
These were failed attempts targeting certain segments but nevertheless its still indicative of devs trying to grow the game.
They organize small scale round robin showmatches. Not a full tournament.
More money per player. Smaller because its 8 player LAN event this time.
If you’re expecting aoe 2 to compete with LOL or Dota, that’s how it will feel. Look back at the situation before 2019 and you’ll get some idea about how good the current scene is. It is a small closed community and we’ll probably not hit 6 digit player base or viewer numbers for another decade. If you understand this you’ll realize even a single esports “no name” team signing up and paying aoe 2 players and casters is a welcoming thing.
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I really believe FE is full hands on deck getting AoM Retold finished and out the window for September. We will probably hear more about AoE 2 after that game releases.
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Also, I doubt they will want to make any changes before the Red Bull tournament. Maybe after it we will get an announcement. I still think that survey has something to do with how they want the game to go forward.
You know, for someone who claims not to be Gargy, you sure are acting a lot like him.
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In effect, yeah. Not that specifically, but he wanted to remove any strategy from the game that he lost to.
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Well, it’s part of the game mechanics…
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