Most maps in this game are not optimally competitive and they tend to favor campers, turtle base building.
The issues are:
Too many resources safely around the starting TC.
Too many resources bunched up in pockets that can be secured with very few defenses.
Neutral markets when they spawn safely in a corner behind your base.
Infinite resources like farms are too fast.
Playing the map should always lead to a substantial advantage the longer you can sustain your hold on the map.
First, cut in half ALL in base resources( including woodlines) except berries. Secondly start all civs with 5 sheep under TC ( remove 2 from the center of the map). Move all resources except berries and a SMALL woodline 9+ tiles away from the main TC. Next more resources should be susceptible to run bys. Also no more than 2 resources should spawn close together once your away from your main resources. After this farm gather rates needs to reduced from 0.75 down to 0.66. Lastly Neutral markets need to resemble the rocky river layoutâmarkets are almost center of the map.
The logic being maps should force you out your main sooner, not as fast as prairie woodline, but much faster than normal. Next having 5 sheep starting would alleviate the burden of getting more starting sheep. Spread the exposed resources forces you to make more defenses. And strategicly you can deny certain resources. Likewise farms are too strongg especially civ with bonuses rates like English and Chinas and HREs. Iâd be okay if they made farms even cheaper but the return on investment needs to take 3mins and always UNTIL imperial be an inferior rate than natural food sources.
Every game should result in sustained map control = the winner.
There is only 1 civ currently that is a boom civ that would need adjustments; and that civ, Malians already need some special attention.
The point of most RTS games are to FIGHT for/over something? If you can consistently sit in your base and perfectly contend the foe that is taking map advantage? What exactly are you fighting for/over? Whatâs the point of being exposed on the map if it grants zero advantages and pose risks???
@CrosstownPiano1 I assure you, these types of changes will not be noticeable at your league; quite frankly the map Praire, minus a few points, already implements everything Iâve suggested?? And what Praire doesnât do, maps like Gorge, Canal, etc., etc. do to make it more competitive? So, I donât understand why youâre being so obtuse?
Iâm sorry, but I think the changes you propose will break the game.
Civs as english or mongols would become totally unstopable if they can freely attack your initial resources.
I also think that having the map control as attacker gives a lot of advantage, and the initial 4k gold isnât as much as you say. Donât forget that the initial stone canât give you a TC and a keep, you need to go to secondary stone to get a keep if you are trying to boom (except for french).
Booming or defend is right now so weak since all the nerfs to outposts, secondary TCs and pallisades. More than ever, booming or defending is weaker and worst than FC or playing aggro.
Iâm a player who likes to play defensive or booming and Iâve noticed patch after patch that is a lot worst and difficult to play boom or to defend since every tool I had to do it has been nerfed. Also, I think you canât force all civs to be played the same way. As I said, there need to be better aggro civs and better defensive civs.
How am I being obtuse when I am clearly stating that your ideas are bad for the game and its playerbase?
The fact you think Prairie is a fun map speaks volumes. It is utterly devoid of merit unless you just main cav civs which given your fear of a player not having to leave their base (thereby yielding the maps resources to you btw) you likely are.
Dude chill. The problem with your changes is right now dark age is totally skippable, and feudal age is a rare age since there are civs who has armored units and civs who doesnât.
If you make resources around TC just out of safe area, you are forcing all civs to battle for these resources out of TC, and in feudal age there are civs whose this change will just make them unplayable.
English could just send longbows to your wood and negate any wood income. Or send a few archer villagers and negate berries or every single resource a lot easier.
Mongols could just send a few spears and win the game minute 4. What can you do vs double production and unsafe resources, except for the sheeps? Nothing.
I donât get why do you think all resources should be not safe and even more, half the amount. I think you are having troubles attacking and you feel that attack should be easier, but the fact is that it is a lot better to attack than deffend.
If you watch proâs tournaments, almost every game the one attacking and with map control is the one who can close the game faster. The games who canât be closed from the attacker usually go to late castle or imperial, where just an error can balance all the game.
I appreciate your honesty. You donât understand what Iâve already explained. Either i did a horrible job explaining it or you were just unable to ascertain what i explained.
I didnât say all the resources should be unsafe. Your alleged example of pro games, IMO appears inconsistent with what Iâve seen. The attacker is at a big risk because starting resources tend to be very safe, such that the offense NEEDS to be substantial or else the attacker is now severely behind.
In previous patch notes the designers have intimated they want the generic 3 playstyle to be viable: booming, rushing, techâing. And maybe they all 3 styles to be comparable or one beats the other like Rock, paper, scissors? IdkâŠ
But right now? The resources are too safe this lends it hands toward booming; thatâs why dark age rush is a gimmick or bust. You cant reliably open up dark barracks because you canât know if the gold/stone will be 8+ tiles away from TC fire or not And not behind the enemy TC.
LETâS just stick to this one point. If it could be guaranteed that every game on an open map, your starting gold would always spawn in front of your base and 9+ tiles away from your TC. could ppl blindly skip dark age potential aggression?? Wouldnât JUST this change FORCE scouting to head directly for the enemy base to check what MIGHT becoming? A change mind you that the patch notes SAID SHOULD already be in the game (but isnât consistently applied).
Well, I agree that dark age is testimonial. I would like more action in dark age but this would need a lot of changes in the game (probably specially to gathering speed and age up cost) but I donât think spawning resources like gold unsafe itâs the way.
On the other hand, I think itâs logic that if the attacker doesnât get an advantage he will be behind. This game in the end is a math game, you spend resources to get advantages. This advantage could be more TCs to get a better income in mid-long time, or an army to kill enemy eco and for this reason, get a better economy.
In the end itâs the same, but one way you get a better eco by increasing your eco, and the other way you get a better eco by decresing enemy eco. But obviously if you do an army and canât decrease the enemy eco, then you would be behind.
To conclude, what I was trying to say with my pros example is that attacking is harder but IMO opinion better (map control and getting the initiative), and defending is easier than attacking but worst (because your eco is under attack and can be idled and killed, but is easier because you need less multitasking and macro skills to balance your eco that youâll need while attacking).
because I made the assumption that the end goal for these changes would be for your perception of fun? Why else would you play a video game?
In the same manner I would assume someone making a suggestion about a recipe would be looking to enhance their enjoyment of a meal rather than catering towards the 0.5% competitive hotdog eating 1v1 community or whatever it is you aspire towards. tldr; I assumed the context would be sufficient but it wasnât so now I am writing a poor analogy instead lol.
I am addressing your points though? Did you miss the part where I ostensibly said they were bad ideas?
I donât understand this? What would be the point of making dark age take longer if there is no added contention?? Your idea here looks like extending dark age JUST to make it longer?? But what exactly is making it take longer accomplishing as it pertains to COMPETITION??
We dont disagree on this principle; I gave the Dark age gold example and previous English Defensiveness examples to suggest just how STRONGLY it favors playing defensive OVER that of being aggressive. So itâs a matter of do I take a BIG RISK and be the aggressor and potentially gain a small advantage. Letâs reiterate the dark age aggression. If I start of the game blindly open up barracks (150w) and get on straggler trees and start making spears to head towards enemy base. What happens if when I finally get over there I see the gold is SAFELY tucked under the enemy TC?? By this time weâre about 2-3mins into the game and I just burnt 150W on a barracks 30 Villager-seconds+ building it, and at least 1-2 spears worth of resources (80-160 resources); meanwhile enemy spend the same total efforts toward his feudal age up. THIS SCENARIO is an instant GG⊠and a horrible game design, IMO.
Your reductive reasoning demonstrates you suffer from dealing with ideas in context?
Here is an analogy I think you can follow:
Saying that I think Praire is a FUN map when I said Praire has some competitive aspects that we can gleam from;
is like saying, I believe Hilter is a good leader because I suggested he was a charmastic speaker?
Thatâs the type of reductive reason youâre demonstrating.
More examples of your being obtuse; whereâs the substance to your point of view? the WHY itâs bad? the HOW itâs bad? examples etc etc? Anyone can emote and say âNOâ, âBADââŠ
You understood me wrong. Iâm not saying more dark age with the game as it is right now. This is why I say that it would need a lot of changes.
Yep, attacking you need to take risks, but if you success you won the game. This is why I said itâs harder but better.
Precisely yesterday a played an abbasid mirror match, where I opened with tech wing into 5 cammel archers + castle age up at min 11, and the other abbasid went 4 TCs. I killed some villagers and idled him with the cammels whereas I just was aiming to age up and flood with ghulams. My plan did well and I ended the game at min 18 when his whole base was idled by my ghulams. This is an example of defending+booming vs attacking that went wrong.
He had no map control so he ended up doing farms in feudal because he couldnât get external food while I was just taking all the berries or deers, losing a lot of time that I took to get to castle, winning a tempo and flooding with ghulams. I know that if I didnât win that tempo I would be lost, because when I started the flood I was on 50 villagers vs 80 by their side. But is a risk you have to take, and if goes well itâs just insta win
Something more needs to be done to better incentivize NON turtle boom strats. Currently the majority of the civs are best played in a turtle boom.
Abby, Byz, Eng, Rus, Mali, China1&2, HRE 1&2* all best played the turtle boomy way.
Delhi, Ottoman*, Mongol, French 1&2 are your more aggro/map taking civs.
Lastly
Ayyubids and Japan and HRE 1 (again) are your Fast Castle, fast tech civs.
Something as simple as guaranting that gold spawns clearly outside TC fire AND always somewhere in front of each personâs base.
Most of the boomy civs have 1 of 2 things in common. Efficient sources of food and/or exceptional defenses. And food is the very resource that nominally would force you out of your base first, so if you donât need food?? Your woodline, your gold (unless youâre mali or Rus/Hre making gold units) and stone, are NOT gonna run out for at least 12-15min into the game. Given most games last an average of 25mins? These boomy civ, safely stay tucked for more than half the freakin match???
More needs to be done!!!
More ideas: increase shoreline, boar, and deer gathering rates AND increase the total number of berry patches that spawn outside your main from bunches of 8 to bunches of 12!
10% increase in wild natural food resources gathering rates and increase the total food yield per source by 20%. If i have to leave the safety of my base to get food it should reward me in some significant capacity over sitting in base.
I agree that it is the maps that most favor economic play but I doubt that competitive maps will be generated, the majority of players are casual; That is why I focus on increasing the cost of villagers by 2Tc to reduce the defenderâs available food.
Itâs actually something the devs wrote in a previous pach notes that has NOT been consistently implemented.
Should have been both teams each have safe gold or both have it unsafe. No mix and matching of safe vs unsafe.
Iâm pressing the issue by going further, if my gold is in front of my base and my enemyâs gold is behind his??? This would be another example of safe vs unsafe.
In fact resource spawn should be symmetric since a exposed gold vs safe is clearly an advantage. Iâve also experienced sometimes ALL my resources in front of my base, while the other player had the resources safe.
But I have a doubt, wouldnât this affect directly tower rushing strategy? If gold or all the resources are symmetric then at spawn time a mongol can know if tower rushing is viable.
And this is what i want to know Exactly!!! I love dark rush (and i donât play mongols), yet if at the start of th game you knew immediately what strats are viable, thatâs the basis of RTS!!
currently Drush are done blind!! And literally a safe enemy resources can spell immediate GG if you took the gamble on opening up Drush.
I find it mind numbing boring that the first 4 minutes of each game is only scouting, sheep RNG, and bountyâŠ??? 4 FUCKING MINUTES of nothingnessâŠ
Even the pros are under stimulated and you can tell bc theyâre clicking 50+ extra buttons per second to keep their reflexes fresh given how UNEVENTFUL the first 4 minutes are.
This is another reason i am for having 5 starting sheep, 3 behind your base and pockets of 2 spread around the map. This will alleviate the mandatory scouting for sheep and open up more flexibility with scouting your enemy. Then if the make resources less safe then maybe we can see earlier aggression.
