Clearly not, but it is meant to be historically inspired, such that people take issue with some bonuses/techs that are too outlandish, that lower the bar for what should be considered a powerful medieval empire. The day AoE2 includes an Eskimo civ, for example, is the day it has gone too far at trying to include all groups of people just for the sake of inclusion.
Extra HP is okayish (although 30 would be enough TBH), they should at least change the name to something Maya, not South American. Imagine giving the Mongols a tech called “Bushido”.
Sure, on the one hand, we have reality, and how these civilizations fared when confronted with superior tech, and on the other hand we have “I’m just a big meanie.” If there’s a way to make them strong that isn’t just total fantasy, I’m all for it. But like I said, the +armor is both silly, uncreative, and nothing short of an major stretch even in terms of actually being inspired by the real Polynesians. They were great warriors to be sure, and remarkable sappers at least in one famous battle, I’d just like to see a better way of representing this than making them powered-up Teuton clones.
Sure, the Mesoamerican cotton armor was fairly effective; many of the Spanish even used it because it was good enough but less cumbersome than steel in the hot/humid climate. Trust me, I’ve read my Bernal Díaz. So American civs getting the standard Armor techs is a reasonable compromise with history for gameplay purposes. Getting bonus armor/attack on top of that is a bit of a stretch, but I can live with it in the existing cases.
I agree in the cases you mentioned. It makes sense to have certain standardized techs that correspond to a certain level of technological proficiency in arms/armor, even if there isn’t a strict literal correspondence between the unit/tech names and whatever was used historically. However this is very different from giving civs huge power ups in areas that they were literally far worse than everyone else in (e.g. Armor for the Polynesians). Literally pick anything else, and it’s likely to be a better match (HP, attack, attack speed are better candidates since Polynesians even today are known for being very robust), or be creative and come up with a new mechanic that better represents those cultures.
Here are some ideas, in no particular order and without any consideration of whether they’d be OP or not:
-1 Free fishing ship with each dock
-Villagers don’t need dropsites for fish and can enter shallow water to fish.
-Pearl Diver tech - Villagers and fishing ships generate a small amount of gold as they work (TBH this might be more appropriate for a SE Asian civ, I just think it’s a cool idea)
-Fishing ships have 3x LOS and move 20% faster.
-Docks can garrison military ships, which are slowly repaired inside the dock
-Can build a Seaside Fort (there’s gotta be a better cultural name for it), basically a mix between a Malay Harbor and a Castle, that can train both land and water UUs, and can garrison ships and vills/land units (and shoots arrows of course).
-Villagers gain +5 HP per Dock Tech
-Ships cost more but deal melee damage