Chinese unit model in game is wrong, period

[SummerNutria26]

China in AOE3 is such a total mess. Supposedly set during the Qing Dynasty under the reign of the Qianlong Emperor hence the flag… But under the history tab it only mentions the Ming Dynasty which was the dynasty before, and they are extremely different to say the least.

The eight banner system unique to the Qing Dynasty was a system where Manchu families are separated under eight flags yellow, white, blue, red, border yellow, border white, border blue, and border red with some banner like yellow, bordered yellow and white to be stronger than other five since it was directly controlled by the emperor at this time, and incase of war male members under their banners were expected to fight under their respective commander of the banners. Since the Manchu ruled over Han and Mongol territory there’s also the Han eight banners and Mongol eight banners respectively.

This is part of a military ceremonial painting of the Qianlong era showing a small portion of the yellow banner army(sorry this is the only one I found where the quality is decent).

A suggestion in game is instead of having the war academy producing blue banners, yellow banners etc have them producing for example:

• Manchu Army: Bow and close cavalry combination.

• Han Army: Spear and matchlock combination.

• Mongol Army: Ranged and close cavalry combination.

• Young Army (irregulars “勇营”): A cheap spear and bow combination.

My biggest grief with China in AOE3 plus the definitive edition is the unit model where its just pure garbage, you can tell that the developers just searched on google images of a random Qing soldier and decided to use that, and its just not comparable to some other nations like Britain where units models are much better in quality and realism.

Top is the Redcoat in the definitive edition compared to the painting created around 1769

Now compare the difference of in game model to the Qianlong era painting Qing war against the Dzungar Khanate in 1759-1766 "平定伊犁回部战图“ please note these are snapshot of a larger painting and the soldiers don’t have a fixed role ex archer been only archers

Spearmen comparison

Arquebus comparison

Archer comparison(CKN was never a wide spread weapon for war especially for the Manchus who values the deadliness of their recurve bow)

Uploading: AOE-ArcherCalv_lv2.png…

Mongol troops comparison, in the painting the Mongolian cavalry were armed with bow and arrow, a matchlock musket, a spear and a sword.

Cavalry comparison

Artillery comparison, light cannons due having to travel through vast desert areas against Dzungar Khanate, but even looking at later paintings against closer opponents much of the cannons Qing Dynasty used were fairly small

Warship comparison with "靖海全图” 1796-1820 last photo shows a fuchuan model far different from the fuchuan imagined in game

Part of painting “姑苏繁华图” 1759 showing the sails on junks rest at bottom and pulled to top instead of the other way around in AOE3

Monk comparison the monk seems to be wearing a Taoist costume which is 999% wrong

Villager comparison no one wore flip flops in China at this time and no one will have the right side of the shirt covering the left since its only for the dead…

I need to go to bed. Nothing is correct, which isn’t surprising since I’ve been playing this game since 2016. I know nothing will change, but maybe some modders will fix things. You never know.

[ArrivedLeader22]

First of all many unit models need to be improved for sure. Some very fictional ones should be replaced with more accurate ones.

But here are some of my additional thoughts.
If the unit visuals are too focused on one period, problem is most units have very similar uniforms (especially as there weren’t clear distinctions of “units” in reality, unlike in games). As in the images here, most mid-Qing infantry and light cavalry had similar hats and clothes. That would harm unit distinguishability. I see that is the case for some mods.

Same applies to Europeans: for example in the early 18th century almost all units, including cavalry (line cavalry, cuirassiers, dragoons for some nations), artillery, etc. wore tricornes and coats with bright regimental or national colors, like the in-game veteran musketeer model.
So for different units they choose some distinct uniforms but tend to avoid similarities across units. That causes misalignments in their time frames: so you have 17th century musketeers with bayonets, artillerymen without hats, skirmishers that look like colonial irregulars, dragoons with metal helmet and armor. Some units start with very “late” looks when they first appeared, far beyond the other units of the same age, like hussars, cuirassiers and cacadores.

So I think a better design that caters for both accuracy and gameplay would be to combine real uniforms from a larger time span, but do not necessarily have to make them all well-aligned in terms of timeframe. In the meantime, time progression should be followed for the same unit line.