'Buildings under construction should build slower when attacked

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
1

This is a proposed balance solution for tower rush spam and for keep drops.
As per the title, when a building that is yet to be finished is attacked it would take “Building Progress Damage” which would delay or even decrease its construction progress.

The end goal of this change is that villagers building an offenseive tower can no longer ignore the defenders units and just focus on just finishing the tower/keep (then jump inside to be safe). Instead with this change the building itself needs to be protected by the attacker, otherwise the construction will not finish.

This means more committment by the attacker to offensive structures and more counterplay options for the defender.

Thoughts on this change idea?

4 Likes
2

I don’t play AoE4, so I can’t say whether this would be reasonable.

I know it would too much of a pain in AoE2, but I can’t speak about AoE4.

3

The tower is a defensive resource, weakening it also weakens the defense

4

This is a solid idea. I do not see how this weakens getting towers up for defensive purposes. Nor does it remove the ability to use it for offensives purposes. As you said, it requires more offensive dedication / shrewd planning by the opponent.

And this feature should be very easy to implement as its already featured in the game in the form of halting construction.

5

I don’t think it’s a good idea because it can be exploited during early game to deny/annoy your opponent. For example, use your scout to attack the enemy landmark, mill, lumber camp, etc, under construction. However, i agree Tower Rush is simply too efficient and deserves some nerfs. These are the ideas that come to my mind:

  • Cost Increase for outposts and arrowslits.
  • Hp nerf
  • Villager bonus damage against defensive buildings (i think these 3 are the ones applied in aoe2)
  • Increased construction time, which decreases under the influence of a resource drop off building (to keep it’s value as a defensive tool)
  • Limit the number of outposts a player can build to a reasonable amount, increased upon aging up ( 2-4-10-20 for example)
  • Allow Villagers to construct rams in feudal age. This wouldn’t totally nullify abbasid dynasty’s bonus.
6

I don’t like it. It seems easily exploitable in the early game to delay enemy buildings.

I would just give villagers significant bonus damage to towers.

They already made buildings under construction take extra damage, if necessary they can just up that amount. I think it’s really just towers that are an issue though.

1 Like
7

English sents one villager to your base and stop you building any towers before you get swarmed by LB’s. Yup yup

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8

en aoe 3 los edificios cuando están siendo construidos sufren el doble de daño

9

I propose a different idea!! Start lumber camp begining of the game instead of rushing to feudal naked and being exposed to TRs…

But I’d like if siege towers did NOT required siege engineering and it gained a new ability whereby it latches onto a tower/keep and completely disables tower/keep attacks AND slow siege of 25 siege dmg per 2s attack speed. With 280 hp, and 30 range resist and .88 tiles/s walk speed. And!!! Villagers can build it!! And it cost 160w and takes 40s to build

It will only work on towers stone towers and keeps and it can still be used to climb over stone walls.

This will give the defender a reaction option to being tower rushes BUT it’s not a free counter so it requires prep and reaction.

1 Like
10

This “fix” seems overly convoluted and prone to many unforeseen consequences.

I think it is better to just give villagers lots of bonus damage against towers. AoE2 does that (and a couple other things that make tower rushes weaker).