China Rework 🐲

Age of Empires III: DE III - Discussion
1

The following article will be about a optimal China rework, changing most of their military upgrade cards and their war academy.

I will try to summarize the main Ideas, if you however are interested in the more detailed and full changes please just look at the bottom of this post. Most of these Ideas come from UpmostRook9474, who kindly allowed me to repost his Ideas.

The plan is to make the Chinese gunpowder units more viable in the late game by giving more options to buff them which would make them more able to compete with other skirmishers. At the same time we want to make the current Chu Ko Nu and Qiang pikeman no longer stronger in the late game and instead easier to gather by reducing their cost and train time. The chinese cavalry would stay almost completely unchanged.

Now the second point of this rework, the chinese war academy. The idea is to split it in two different barracks, one for all Age II units [Banner Camp] and the other for all Age III units [Banner Garrison - only available from Age III]. With these war academy changes the power of the chinese FF should be slower and at the same time you should now be able build all your units in your barracks instead of a few units spilling over to the castle.

The promised Card changes, I’m now quoting from UpmostRook9474. I changed however two things from his Ideas, the things I changed will be highlighted in a blue background.

No changes:

  • Mongolian Scourge (II)
  • Repelling Volley (III)
  • Siege Combat (III)

Removed:

  • Siege Hitpoints (II)
  • Siege Attack (II)
  • Standard Army Hitpoints (II)
  • Territorial Army Combat (III)
  • Manchu Combat (IV)
  • Old Han Reforms (IV)

With changes:

  • Double-Faced Armor (III): will now also affects Steppe Riders<
  • New Army (II): Renamed to “New Weaponry”, and also gives Changdao & Arquebusiers +5% HP.<
  • Fire Dragon Manual (IV): Gives Flamethrowers & Flying Crows better improvements than their current effects, but costs 300 coins.
  • Western Reforms (IV): Also allows researching Infantry Breastplate, Flint Lock and Paper Cartridge in Villages.

New cards:

  • Old Tactics (II): Gives CKN, Qiang & Flamethrowers +20% HP.
  • Baturu (III): Gives Qiang, Changdao & Keshiks +15% HP & attack.
  • Field Force (III): Gives Changdao, Arquebusiers & Meteor Hammers +15% HP & attack.
  • Imperial Hunt Ritual (IV): Gives Steppe Riders & Keshiks +50% HP & attack, but +25% cost.
  • Tuanlian System (IV): Gives CKN & Qiang free Disciplined upgrade, -33% cost & train time.
  • Crouching Tiger Cannon (IV): Gives improvements to Hand Mortars, but also makes them use 2 population.

Reuse card icons:

  • Standard Army Hitpoints → Old Tactics
  • Manchu Combat → Field Force
  • Old Han Reforms → Tuanlian System

On the other hand, War Academic is divided into two buildings: Banner Camp and Banner Garrison.

  • Banner Camp: Costs 150 wood, Buildable from Age II, can train Old Han, Standard, Ming, and Mongolian, and upgrade their units.
  • Banner Garrison: Costs 250 wood, Buildable from Age III, can train Territorial, Forbidden, Imperial, and Black Flag, and upgrade their units.
3 Likes
2

Sounds like a interesting mod. Go forth and make it

1 Like
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Why would you want to nerf flamethrowers even further lol

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Nerf flamethrowers? The idea is to give them a bigger buff in compensation for a card cost, I’m not sure how you take that as a Nerf. Please can you explain to me your problem because I’m not sure what else you could mean.

5

WIth the elimination of 3 artillery cards, while only giving them back one card through hp?

You don’t really specify much on how Fire Dragon Manual is gonna change.

6

First of all with these changes the flamethrowers would only lose their 15% DMG card in age II. The hp card if you didn’t notice merged with standard army hp card now Old Tactics II. Artillery combat still exists and a buff for the fire dragon manual card would actually be even better.

Let me recount you will have to send 3 cards instead 4, you get 5% more max hp, however we lose 15% dmg. I still don’t know in what way we could buff the fire dragon manual card in age 4, but I still can’t see how that is a Nerf for flamethrowers. I dare say depending on the change of the aforementioned card it’s even a buff for flamethrowers.

If you are not happy with these changes you can always give constructive criticism, because I myself don’t play flamethrowers that much and am in no position to say what they need the most to make them viable.

8

Indeed it would be nice if I could make a mod. Do you know if there are any guides to how to create a mod? Because I didn’t seem to find any.

9

Hi. If you wanna mention a forum user, you can type ‘@’ in front of the ID, then the system will notify the user. Just like @M1kazuki6861.

In my original idea, I move it to Age II, affect Steppe Riders too but only allow it to affect Keshiks since Age III.

The reason is, the current cards improve Steppe Riders HP in Age II. I concern that they really need the buff at the time so I make Double-Faced Armor do the job. (The resistance improvement is also kind of HP buff in my opinion.) Iron Flails and Meteor Hammers are unavailable in Age II so the buff is safe to them, but Keshiks may not deserve the buff in Age II.

If Steppe Riders can be fine for losing the Age II buff, absolutely Double-Faced Armor can affect them without moving to Age II.

In my original idea, I don’t move it to Age II.
I doubt the Changdao and Arquebusiers in Age II are acceptable and balance. Maybe it’s fine, I don’t know.

10

Yes maybe you are right and the steppe riders need the buff in age II, I just feared that steppe riders + keshiks would be to good in age II with all these changes which would then end in a nerf.

About new weaponry being in age II is actually fine in my opinion because their stats are just that bad. My thought process was that while you age up to age 3 you are able to send yourself the card. But I may be wrong with both of these changes.

Another idea I have is moving Baturu to age IV and improving the stats from 15% hp & dmg → 20% hp & dmg, as this card now will only buff qiang/changdao and keshiks. With that change I hope to further incentives players going for an FI and using “Tunlian system” to swarm your enemy with trash units in age IV.

As then would be more potential space in age III we could argue having “double faced Armor” and “new weaponry” in age III. Just doing some theory crafting, please tell me guys what you think.

11

I do not but the guy behind the age of the world mod might have some pointers.

Check out there discord

1 Like
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If these ideas can indeed help improve the disappointing aspects of the civ and curb the overpowering aspects, then I hope to see it officially adopted into the game one day, rather than just a mod.

In my opinion, they should be with more HP and faster speed, which help them to get close to the enemy infantry, and the next maybe cheaper cost and better siege ability. Their attack is pretty decent so I choose to get other improvements in exchage of the +15% attack. But if they really need an attack improvement, it still can be a part of improvements from the change of Fire Dragon Manual.

Changdao & Arquebusiers automatically get Disciplined upgrade in Age III, so it is decent to turn existing Qiang & CKN that have not been upgraded directly into Disciplined Changdao & Disciplined Arquebusiers. And I also give them +5% HP as a small reward to encourage more People use this card.

In Age II, I don’t think this effect matters much because it doesn’t change the types of units, and there probably aren’t enough existing units. However, as long as people are willing to play the game in Age II with Qiang & CKN, this card is suitable for them after hitting Age III.

15% is pretty enough. You can use this card to specifically improve the anti-cavalry units, which is really good and needed in Age III. Increasing to 20% will also buff the Changdao and Keshiks but I think both of them have had enough improvements. On the other hand, Tuanlian system is aimed to make Qiang & CKN quite cheap and easier to spawn in the late game, so I would not like to make them stronger at the time.

Being a Age III card, Baturu still can be used when you want to go FI Tuanlian. If you desire to make FI Tuanlian more powerful, it might be a good way to make it give free Honored upgrade, not just Disciplined upgrade. Although I think there are potential concerns.

13

Yes for the speed problem I have two solutions either giving the Chinese with “western reforms” [Age IV] additionally to the infantry upgrades, Trunion. This upgrade gives Artillery 15% more movement speed which would also help hand mortars and the flying crow.

The other solution would be that the vet, guard and imp upgrade more movement speed give. Something like 0.25 for each, which translates to 0.50 more movement speed in Age IV.

Additionally they could improve the fire rate improvement of the card “fire dragon manual” [Age IV].
About flamethrowers being bad against buildings, I tried them out. it would be enough if they just give them a little bit higher multiplier against buildings. No reason for them to perform that bad against buildings.

Yes I absolutely share your opinion, I dare say they wouldn’t even need to make the food cost of this card higher. 500 food is more than enough in my opinion.

Yes I can see the problem, yeah you are probably right.

Another point I want to talk about is the Banner Garrison and Camp. We need to adjust the HP of both of these buildings, because we can’t lower the cost of the Banner Garrison due to fact that building the Banner Garrison only from Age III will probably not slow down the Chinese FF enough.
We have to remember about all the card changes that will buff Chinas power in age III.

My idea for the adjusted HP of both buildings:

Banner Camp
150 wood - 2000 HP (I think 1500 HP would be to little)

Banner Garrison
250 wood - 3000 HP (here the same 3500 HP would be a tick too much probably)

For all the people who read this:
I want to make clear, with all this changes I don’t want to make china op. I just aim to give them more options to play. Optimal would be if every unit is usable → neither troll nor over powered.
I would love it if china doesn’t need nerfs or buffs after these changes.

PS I’m actually lying please give the arquebusiers the one base attack back, just Nerf the porcelain tower trickle in age III by 0,5 :sob: