Byzantines' Greek Fire Tech Buff, among other ideas

The current one is not such powerful (compare with Persians, Saracens, etc.) so I think it is fine.

Chinese, Koreans and Japanese had never hired Italian mercenaries ever. 11

Woah, 15 gold less from one day to another may be too much? I wouldn’t suggest such buff not even for the mameluke.

Maybe let’s start with 5 gold less, and then remove another 5 or leave them as they are. Anyway the biggest problem is still the elite upgrade cost and the logistica cost.

I’m all for historical accuracy, if not I wouldn’t suggest that byzantines should get partian tactics, but that re has to be a balance reason to a suggest buff too.

I mean, giving them access to PT would at least improve the flexibility of their tech tree (their CA would lack BL, but at least they would also get full armor and attack) for example.

What would fire towers do instead? Or what would do healing mills in middle to late castle age when byz already have faster healing monks? What would do garrison ability for gathering point such late in the game (or where is the common theme with greek fire?) especially when byz are already full of defensive bonuses?

GF was a tech introduced to make byz a bit better on water, not to throw off the balance on land. I guess that at least thematically you could justify giving archers +1 attack after chemistry (basically doubling down its effect for archers and siege units), but do they really need it?

That’s the thing, they have everything defensive oriented:

  • tougher building :heavy_check_mark:
  • cheaper counter units :heavy_check_mark:
  • free TW and TP :heavy_check_mark:
  • faster attacking FS (good for defending on water maps) :heavy_check_mark:
    Some of those are useful for aggressive purposes too, but mainly are to bring the byz player up to get that cheap imp.
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They already have mid game flexibility.

Byzantines don’t need any buffs and are in a good position. Their recent buff helps them tremendously for their playstyle

If you mean, consistently getting rekt in Feudal is a good position, then I agree with you.

On topic:

I think making lumber camps, mining camps and mills garrisonable (similarly to khmer houses) but with 10 garrison space would be an interesting idea. Maybe to replace the free town watch and town patrol. This would help with their feudal survival, but idk if this could open up some cheese potential with new forms of laming.

Other idea would be to make repairs on stone defenses (so that excludes tc) X% faster. This could give them some tower rush potential, and make their feudal age interesting.

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I mean that they are great on closed maps and therefore don’t need any changes. They are already one of the top tier arena civs.
If you are expecting to match Mayans with archers or Franks with scouts on arabia then you are playing the civ wrong. Make use of outpost, wall, don’t shy away from using your stone (walls) until you hit Castle Age. Byzantines don’t need any changes

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They seem above average in water maps. Not sure what would make them strong in closed maps. They have good monastery, but siege is average at best, slow boom due to no eco bonuses, and have lack of power units. Your advices make sense, but this does not help the fact that Byzantines consistently get crushed in Feudal Age on open maps.

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The HP bonus and the counter unit bonus helps them to turtle on open maps (like making arabia arena). Byzantines are a reaction civ, you wait, you scout what you opponent is doing and then you make counter units. And they do have power units: arbalest, siege ram, bombard cannon, cataphract + cheap skirm. Even their hussar is okay when gold runs out. Byzantines, as well as other civs that don’t do too well need a different playstyle/strategy than the no-brainer meta civs such as mayans or franks.

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I get that, but you die hard to meso civs, (making skirms vs civs that have eagles is
 well you try it and tell me), lack of bloodlines means that going scouts is also kind of bad, because the enemy can pick it up and just overpower your scouts. You would have to wall up and probably defend with towers in most games, but then at that point, it would be just better to give them some buff and give them the option to go offensive with towers.

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This thread has a lot of interesting ideas. Seems like I’m in the minority here, but I find Byzantines to be strong defensively in Feudal and Castle Age. The building HP is helping before any other civs have Masonry or Architecture. Fully upgraded spears and skirms at a large discount allow you to cost effectively counter scouts/archers and knights/crossbows.

I struggle with Byzantines in the late game, where the missing Blast Furnace is apparent. Not saying they should have this tech, it is balanced without, but makes their units less population efficient. Hard to get a big push when combined with their with their poor siege and mediocre cavalry.

I’d be all for adding +1 range to siege, but may as well do it through allowing siege engineers. Even defensively, it’s difficult to hold ground when enemy trebs outrange yours, enemy bombard cannons can safely snipe yours, and enemy arbalesters match your Onager range (or exceed it if Britons).

Bloodlines would be nice, but would need to be careful about making their Feudal/Castle Age too strong. This would probably also require a nerf to Cataphract base health, so they end up roughly where they are now after Bloodlines. The extra HP would be great for their camels, which still would be missing +2 attack to justify the decreased cost.

Anyway, I play pretty casually. Just wanted to give another viewpoint.

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They are one of the worst civs for TG pocket out there

My suggestions:

  1. Feudal Age is 10% cheaper, Castle age is 20%, Imperial Age is 30%
  2. Greek fire +9dmg for castles, town centers and towers against siege units (a similar effect to the now defunct Persian UT Boiling Oil)
    3) Give command lines in Greek to Byzantines

Maybe:
4) Receive Bloodlines but Elite Cataphract -20hp or -10hp.
5) Foragers collect 25% more food from berries.

Weird statement, what do you want to tell me here? :smiley:

The problem with bloodlines for byzantines is not only that cataphracts would need rebalance but also their camels. Keep in mind that byzanitne have THE BEST camels in castle age. Giving them bloodlines would make them too strong.

The suggestions @WhiteMagick4 is giving are all already in the game and taken by other civs so that doesn’t work. The only thing i could see would be greek fire granting bonus damage vs rams for castles and towers. Nothing more. Byzantines are a good civ, just more on the harder to play side of things

Which suggestions are you referring to?

This is a huge buff. Especially when they have cheap camels

Thye are fine in 1v1 but in Teamgames they are much worse, ok as Flank but trash at pocket

Byzantines are pretty bad on Flank
 i mean, if a civ dies easy in early game in 1v1, it’s not gonna fare well in flank

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To elaborate on Byzantine Camels. I don’t think they’re currently the best in Castle Age. Berbers have a 15% discount and Bloodlines. It is true that with equal resources 8 Byzantine Camels (100 HP) usually beat 7 Berber Camels (120 HP). However, I don’t think camel vs camel is the best test. Against knights, 7 Berber Camels perform better than 8 Byzantine Camels. I don’t find Byzantine Camels to be a great counter when they lose to generic knights in equal numbers (admittedly still cost effective).

If they received Bloodlines then they would be the best briefly, for a mid-game defensive power spike (countering knight rush civs better than just pikes). Byzantines are also missing the option of discounted Knights and Light Cav, so even with good camels they’ll have a harder time playing offensive or raiding.

To continue the Berber comparison, we should look at Imperial Age. At this point Berbers have a 20% discount to fully upgraded heavy camel (with bloodlines and blast furnace), as well as a regeneration unique tech. Byzantine’s low-attack, low-health generic heavy camels don’t really seem like a good deal at 25% reduced cost. Someone suggested making the discount 30%, but I’d rather just see them get Bloodlines. Then they’re only missing +2 attack and the regeneration of Berbers, while being 5% cheaper.

Edit: Should probably mention Paladin in the Bloodlines discussion. Byzantines currently have the worst Paladins in the game. They lose to Celts (2nd worst, missing Plate Barding and Bloodlines), even if the Byzantine lands the first hit. Adding Bloodlines would balance the Byz Paladin against the Celt, and whoever hits first would win. They’d still be unique, with the Byzantine having more health and armor (fitting, defensive) and the Celt having more attack. Byzantine Paladins would still lose to any other Paladin civ, including Burgundians (missing Bloodlines, but full Blacksmith upgrades).

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Another possible use of the fire tower is for use on the shorelines to help vs early ships defending docks or near-shore resource camps.