This is an analysis of the current civilization balance in our much beloved game AOE2:DE.
Methodology:
I visited empirestatsonline to help see data regarding the winrates of various civilizations.
The website provides information on the winrate of civilizations based on:
A. Four tiers of game duration
B. Five Elo Brackets.
Total 9 categories.
I consider a civilization overpowered if they have an overall winrate of over 52.5%
I consider a civilization underpowered if they have an overall winrate of under 47.5%.
To analyse how a civilization is over- or underpowered, I checked their winrate across those 4 levels of game duration and 5 elo brackets. I.e. total 9 winrates/categories.
Below I present the civilizations with winrates over 52.5% or under 47.5% and an analysis of their winrates based on those 9 winrates.
Results:
Potentially overpowered civilizations:
Romans: They have a winrate of over 52.5% in 8 of the 9 categories. Overall: 55.1%
Malians: Winrate of over 52.5% in 7 out of 9 categories.Overall: 54.1%
Malay: 7/9 Overall: 53.2%
Bulgarians: 7/9 Overall: 53%
Vikings: 3/9 Overall: 52.6%
Potentially underpowered civilizations:
Inca: They have a winrate below 47.5% in 9 of the 9 categories. Overall: 41.3%
Muisca 8/9. Overall: 43.4%
Byzantines 7/9 Overall: 46.9%
Georgians 6/9 Overall: 46.9%
Mapuche 5/9 Overall: 47.5%
Britons 4/9 Overall: 47.3%
This concludes the analysis of the results.
Feel free to express your thoughts on the methodology and results, and suggest any balance changes you wish to see for the civilizations above or any other civilization.
I don’t trust numbers to tell the full Truth. For example, i sincerely doubt that byzantines and georgians that are always so high on any pros tier list, are always picked in stier tournaments, are weaker then Sicilians that are not featured here but are some of the clear worst
Likewise, some of those “potentially OP civs” are civs that we just seldom see in some specific settings, but are nowhere near too strong, while some of the actual strongest civs are nowhere to be seen in the list
Except for the Inca and Muisca, I think the overall balance of the game is really good.
At this point, the balance team should focus on balancing civs across different ELOs and match durations, which will be difficult to achieve with such a limited number of games.
Romans were cosistels used by hera in red bull wololo with good winrate. They have also been consistently high in general Statistics, it’s time for a nerf. 4% overall ego bonus instead of 5%
Georgians, like Chinese, are a very hard civ to play. Pros are good enough with them that the difficulty disappears and the strengths shine through, but for the average player that difficulty takes so much focus that any advantage the civ could provide gets swamped by the easier play of the other civs.
Sicilians, on the other hand, are an easy civ, and their bonuses are automatically taken advantage of. The reduced bonus damage taken means that an un-upgraded scout takes 4 hits from a spearman to kill instead of 3 or an archer takes 2 more hits to kill. And due to the power of Lanchester’s laws those small bonuses build up quickly.
What if the Roman bonus was 3 +1% per age. The biggest place it hits hard is early on but it then becomes 6% in Imp Age. Now if this is super important then as well then I get why it might be too much but really the only food is farms most mining nodes are depleted leaving slightly faster wood and farms… for an infantry civ to ith some siege meanwhile Celts and Slavs also infantry and siege siege civs have had all along better wood or farms respectively
Think this would be too large of a drop. I think down to 4% would be enough.
A more interesting idea, but would be a lot of numbers in AGE (adjusting farming rates is more complicated than just increasing farmer work rate)
I don’t think Bulgarians need a nerf. They struggled for a long time due to not having an eco bonus, and only became viable when supplies was removed.
Bit more complicated response for a subject that’s been discussed elsewhere, but I’d focus on the reverting the changes that impact feudal age and ignore the dark age changes.
A good change. Don’t know about the specific numbers, but they do seem well balanced for a lower cost.
A change that affects 1 unit that isn’t even available in Feudal age (if you don’t count Xolotl warriors, which also aren’t available in Feudal age). If Konas need a buff, then they can get it to their stats directly. As I understand it though, not needing techs to be viable is one of their strengths.
I think 2/10/15 would be better: don’t want them to be too strong in Feudal age. Or something like “cav regenerate 15% HP/min starting in castle age”.
Team bonus was nerfed for team games, though I’d be fine with a civ bonus bringing it back up for themselves. Yeomen giving extra damage to archers would be too strong though (Briton late game arb/longbow mass is still very strong, as their archers outrange their counters, including some more volatile counters like onagers)
Why? Costs would end up as 475 for Feudal, 680f/170g for castle (same as Italians), and 700f/560g (up from 670f/536g)
Romans: keep the 5% faster working but gain “but resources deplete 10% faster”. I’m honestly not sure if even I would like this one.
Georgians: HP regen is changed to 15% HP/min and switches places with cavalry taking less pop space. Gain Thumb Ring or first Fortified Church is half price.
Muisca: Herbalism (move 15% faster) and the melee armor bonus also apply to Guecha Warriors. And Guecha Warrior healing stacks or can “overcharge” their health.
Chinese: “Start with +3 villagers but -50 wood and -200 food” bonus changed to “Start with +3 villagers but -150 food” and “Town Centers support +10 population” bonus removed.
This would change it so a standard build order start would be close to optimal, because instead of having no food to start with players would just be housed.
Second Town Center in feudal age is replaced with a “little town center” that works 1/2 as fast and is a fair bit cheaper.
Inca, Mapuche, Muisca, and Tupi: gain an imperial age upgrade for slingers that gives a further +3 vs infantry and +3 vs siege.
Britons: longbowman moved to archery range, replaces crossbowman, stats adjusted if necessary. Gain new unique unit in the castle. Yeoman gains effect “Archer-line is trained 75% faster”.
Mapuche: Kona cost changed from 65 food 40 gold to 85 food 20 gold.
Malay: lose free infantry armor, gain “Infantry take -15% population space”, lose plate armor.
