Demeter and Persephone need improvements

[EricTheRed283]

Massive changes to Demeter and her unique minor age up choice

Age of Mythology: Retold - Update 19.14612 - Age of Empires - World's Edge...

Demeter’s Wrathful Gaze Update

This patch brings a few new additions to Demeter! Some new technologies to improve Demeter’s utility, a new portrait, and balance changes.

Players who own the New Gods Pack: Demeter can now choose an alternate appearance for Demeter. Bring out the wrathful side of Demeter by swapping her portrait to the new glowing eyes version.

To opt in to using the alternate version of Demeter’s portrait, you can swap it at any time, similar to other alternate portraits.

Three new technologies have been added to Demeter to enhance your gameplay experience and available utility while playing as Demeter.

Guiding Flame
Hestia’s guiding flame increases your ships line of sight and attack range.

Harvest of Souls
Persephone enhances your infantry allowing them to harvest souls whenever they defeat an enemy, increasing their damage and attack speed for a short duration.

Hymn of the Wildwood
Pan teaches your heroes the hymn of the wildwood, which allows them to heal nearby allied units in the area.

• God Bonuses have been adjusted as follows:
  • Removed:
    • +1 Villagers can work on a Farm.
    • Village Centers have additional HP and increased attack per garrisoned Villager.
    • Buildings build faster when close to Gold mines.
  • Added:
    • Village Centers trains units 25% faster.
    • Herdables fatten 25% faster, and can fatten 15% more.
    • Human soldiers and myth units train +10% faster per age.

Developer Note: As part of a soft redesign of Demeter, we are putting more power budget and focus on the economic aspect of Demeter rather than the defensive side, and giving her a fitting myth unit-related bonus, as all Greeks have.

• Herdables spawned from aging up no longer follow rallypoints.
• Divine Labor (Technology): adjusted as follows
  • No longer increases Villager wood & gold carry capacity.
  • Villagers gather from Herdables and Farms 10% faster.
  • Villager hitpoints healed for each drop-off reduced from 18 → 10.
  • No longer researchable at Town or Village Centers, it is instead researchable in the Granary.

Minor Gods

Pan

• New Technology: Hymn of the Wildwood
  • Heroes heal nearby units for 0.75 HP/s, in a 5 radius.
  • Costs 150 gold 20 favor.
  • 40 second research time, available in the Temple.
• Pan’s Pioneers (Technology): adjusted as follows
  • No longer spawns Lykaons upon Town or Village Center completion.
  • New effect: Buildings cost -10% less wood.
  • New effect: +1 Villagers can gather from farms.
  • Cost increased from 100 gold 15 favor → 200 food 20 favor.
  • No longer researchable in the Temple, instead researchable in the Storehouse & Granary.
• Thorned walls (Technology): now also affects Towers and Fortresses.
• Predatory Instinct (Technology): adjusted as follows
  • Renamed to Call of Lykaion.
  • No longer increases damage by +2 hack.
  • No longer increases speed by 8.33%.
  • No longer allows Lykaons to be transformed at will, as this feature is present on the base unit.
  • New effect: Town and Village Centers now spawn 1 Lykaon for each present and future.
  • New effect: Lykaons now gain +25% damage.
  • Cost changed from 300 food 20 favor → 200 food 14 favor.

Hestia

• Communal Hearth (God Power): adjusted as follows
  • Repeat cost increased from +5 → +25.
  • Cooldown increased from 150 → 180 seconds.
  • Villager gather rate multiplier increased from 10% → 15%.
• New Technology: Guiding Flame
  • Increases ship line of sight by +4.
  • Increases ship attack range by +15%.
  • Costs 200 wood 15 favor.
  • 25 second research time, in the Dock.
• Gracious Hospitality (Technology): adjusted as follows
  • No longer increases population for Farms near Town Centers.
  • Now increases the House build limit by +2.
  • Cost increased from 150 food 20 favor → 275 gold 22 favor.
  • No longer researchable from the Town Center, it is instead researchable from houses.

Persephone

• Underworld Invasion (God Power): adjusted as follows
  • Hitpoint reduction of Eidolon units reduced from -33% → removed.
  • Now spawns a minimum of 30 Eidolons at base, with +30 per Town Center. (Maximum 150 total units)
  • The casting player can no longer build any Town or Village Centers during the duration of the power.
  • Only human soldiers are valid Eidolon targets.
  • Active time reduced from 200 → 180 seconds.
  • Repeat cost reduced from +75 → +50.

Developer Note: These changes aim to make the power more similar to Ragnarok’s playstyle by creating clear counter-play through myth units.

• New Technology: Harvest of Souls
  • Infantry attack 20% faster and deals 15% more damage upon killing an enemy unit.
  • Costs 150 food 150 gold 25 favor.
  • 40 second research time, in the Armory and Military Academy.
• Sacred Land (Technology): adjusted as follows
  • No longer gives farms a healing aura.
  • New effect: Villagers working on farms also grant 0.1 gold per second while gathering.
  • New effect: Villagers gather 10% faster from farms.
  • Cost increased from 100 gold 15 favor → 200 food 20 favor.

Myth Units

Lykaon (Pan): adjusted as follows
Can now transform at will, without needing an upgrade.
Bonus damage multiplier vs siege 2x → removed.
Bonus damage vs sentry towers 2.5x → 4x, and applies to all tower-type buildings.
Food gathering rate from Huntable and Herdable animals increased from +25% → +50%.
Cost changed from 100 gold 80 wood 15 favor → 165 gold 15 favor.
Population cost reduced from 2 → 1 (Villager version only).

Hamadryad (Hestia): cost reduced from 200 wood 50 gold 20 favor → 230 wood 20 favor.

• Amazon Archer (Demeter): adjusted as follows
  Build limit 10 → removed.
  Movement speed increased from 4.0 → 4.8.
  Bonus damage multiplier vs buildings 2.2x → removed.
  Hitpoints reduced from 160 → 120.
  Population cost increased from 2 → 3.
  Cost changed from 85 wood 65 gold → 85 food 95 wood.
  Train time reduced from 12 → 9.5 seconds.
  Damage reduced from 13 pierce 2 divine → 13 pierce 1 divine.
  Attack range reduced from 26 → 24.
  Weight class increased from 5 → 6.

Developer Note: We’ve adjusted the design of the Amazon Archer to be the first gold-less human unit, and shifted its power into being a fast, long-range super archer, rather than a slow, build-limited super archer with bonus damage against buildings.

I wonder what everyone thinks about all of this it’s so much to take in.

[EricTheRed283]

aomstats - Age of Mythology: Retold stats and leaderboards

So far Demeter is much more popular to play and all her unique age up choices are most popular to use but she is still having a hard time winning be 2nd worst win rate so far.

[2gv]

Wither is absolutely the worst godpower ever created. The Harpy is still a filler unit.

Make Wither finally useful and replace the Pegasus with the Harpy in Classical Age, allowing her to pick up only human units but without requiring the upgrade, this unit still need a heavy rework.

Most importantly, Demeter seems to suffer from the same old problems, lack of power spike in classical or heroic, lack of a clear direction.

But it’s too early to make predictions, last patch is good overall, at least.

[EricTheRed283]

https://ageofempires.fandom.com/wiki/Wither

Creates a sterile area with 30 length and 4 width in the targeted direction which spreads in a line for 4.25 seconds and remains for the god power’s duration.
All Berry Bushes, trees, and Farms (including friendly ones) in the sterile area are destroyed. Destroys Arcadian Meadow as well.
It has a hidden effect of damaging Walking Woods and Carnivorae by 50% of their hit points. It damages neither Hamadryads, even in their tree forms, nor Dryads.
No new Farms can be planted intersecting the zone for the duration of the god power. It also prevents invoking “floral/arboreal” god powers like Arcadian Meadow, Walking Woods, Gaia Forest, Carnivora, Hesperides Tree, and Peach Blossom Spring on it.
All enemy and wild units inside the zone have -25% movement speed, indicated by a red visual effect.

I don’t think Wither is such a terrible God Power. You can use it to mess up someones food economy by destroying berries and farms, can open a clear path into a enemies walled base by destroying trees that helped make them safe, can slow enemies allowing you to escape a bad fight, can eliminate a god power or weaken others.

Yes the Harpy needs improvements its only non Hera Mythical Age advantage over a Heroic Age Stymphalian Bird is its faster moving and can pick up and drop units. Harpy needs a buff to its health and it needs to more quickly drop enemy units by default while killing villagers/human instantly and doing more damage to Myth units.

If you remove Pegasus then the Harpy will also need to be made cheaper like the Pegasus is otherwise you will have worse scouting capability when playing as Demeter then the other Greeks and the Harpy will need to be much weaker to adjust for it being cheaper otherwise it will be OP.

Demeter is clearly the Greek economy choice and they improved that in the new patch.
Herdables improve Favor gather rate when near a Temple. (max. 10 herdables per Temple)
Town and Village Centers spawn Herdables on age up.
Herdables fatten 25% faster and hold +15% Food.
Village Centers train units 25% faster.

Demeter’s Blessing increases Villager Farm and Herdable gathering rates and heals them when dropping Resources.
Each age has a age up choice that benefits your economy.

[2gv]

The fact is that the Harpy in mythic age makes no sense, you can buff it but it will continue to be bad.

Making it a classical age scout with the same line of sight and cost as Pegasus and with the ability to pick up human units would give her a purpose at least, it shouldn’t be a fighting myth unit imo, i would indeed remove its ranged attack entirely.

Wither is too situational and bad, you can use it to disrupt opponent treeline or berries at best, but when used offensively during a fight it just slows down units a bit, it’s almost completely useless.

I think Wither should disrupt economy in a much wider area, similar to Nuba godpower.

The other changes made in the last patch are good, tho.

[EverybodysFoo1]

@2gv

Harpy

is cooler than siren just replace siren and buff the unit or yeah make it a classical age scout (and rework siren!..)

@2gv

Wither

should get replaced.

@2gv

The other changes made in the last patch are good, tho.

agreed that + the amazon buff and mythic unit buff (with faster traintime for Demeter) are really sweet changes.

[kjohnhayes]

@EricTheRed283

I don’t think Wither is such a terrible God Power.

It has potential. I always felt that instead of slowing enemies it should weaken and slowly drain health from huntables (similar to what drought does to buildings). That way it can be duel use: you can harm an enemy or use it to help your villagers hunt dangerous prey.

[2gv]

What I’m expecting from a Wither rework is something that helps Demeter win the boomy war of attrition against the opponent.

Draining the opponent huntables and herdables’ amount of food in addition to deleting berries, farms and trees is a good idea.

The area of effect should also be larger, allowing it to hit animals and other resources on its path if you’re lucky enough.

I would entirely replace this godpower with something else, but that’s another story.

[2gv]

Divine Labor: 200 food 15 favor (+10% farms and herdables gathering rate)

Pan’s pioneer: 200 food 20 favor (allows 2 vill on farms)

Call of lykayon: 200 food 14 favor (a lycaon spawns from each towncenter)

A total of 600 food and 50 favor in 2nd age.

The cost of the techs above seems extremely random, those are all economic techs that you want to ideally grab as soon as possible if you’re playing Pan and you are going for a farm build, especially the one that grants 2 villagers on farms for cheaper farms.

Unless you’re playing some huge 4v4 or 5v5 teamgames you’ll never have 600 food and 50 favor available to research them early, when they matter the most.

[EricTheRed283]

Now Demeter has the lowest win rate while still being 4th most popular to play but with a lower play rate percentage then before.

[2gv]

I’m not surprised.

Pan has potential now, but the fact that you can’t research any of his economic techs early on and you can’t even research Divine Labor immediately is a huge hindrance to Demeter’s scaling possibilities.

The Lycaon costs more than a Kuafu but it is a worse economic unit than the latter, he should cost less gold or a mix of gold and wood again.

Why does Village Center spawn only one herdable on age-up instead of three? Would spawning two more herdables really have broken the game? Lol.

[EricTheRed283]

Demeter seems to be much more suited for team games then 1v1 games.

[Cajocu01]

@EricTheRed283

Demeter seems to be much more suited for team games then 1v1 games.

Gods with stronger late game and weaker early game do better in games where games pace slower and your allies can help you, which team games do for most people.

[2gv]

Siren, Harpy and Wither godpower need complete rework.

The rest is ok, just the new economic techs need to be cheaper.

[EverybodysFoo1]

@2gv

Siren, Harpy and Wither godpower need complete rework.

totally agree.

@2gv

The rest is ok, just the new economic techs need to be cheaper.

i agree they did huge improvements in the other parts from what they designed as a base which could have been avoidable from the beginning for the most part if they would have listend more to the community but it is what it is and from what we got they finally do a better and better job! i would even say demeter - except for the three things above (and i would add the demeter portrait) - are really damn solid/good now!

[Uncletbag]

Something I think is a massive problem is honeslty Pan. All of the technologies to improve eco literally just cost too much. I think in total theyre all 90 something favor and 900 resources. Theyre priced like theyre vault of erebus or something. Loakens are also 165 gold 15 favor. Like jesus. I get theyre suppost to be a hunter that is hard to raid but its a little steep. Also im still not even sure what wither is suppost to accomplish its incredibly bad lol.

[Aainiikkusu]

I just found out Wither has a movement debuff on enemies so I’m thinking it may be used as some tool to stop the enemy army from retreating but I’m not so sure how good it is at doing that.

[Uncletbag]

IT’s true. I don’t it justfeels like a really awful forest fire from norse. At least norse FF does damage however.

[EricTheRed283]

Age of Mythology: Retold - Update 19.16313 - Age of Empires - World's Edge...

Demeter

• Wither (God Power): movement speed reduction of enemy units increased from -25% → -35%.
• Herdable fattening speed increased from +25% → +40%.
• Herdables can fatten +15% → +20% more.
• Divine Labor (Technology): cost reduced from 200 food 15 favor → 125 gold 10 favor.

Minor Gods

Pan

• Arcadian Meadow (God Power): adjusted as follows
  • Radius increased from 19 → 25.
  • Duration reduced from 115 → 75 seconds.
  • God Power blocking radius reduced from 28 → 25.

Hestia

• Hestia’s Hearth (God Power): adjusted as follows
  • Base convert time reduced from 3.655 → 3 seconds.
  • Additional convert time per HP increased from 0.005 → 0.01 seconds.
  • Radius increased from 18 → 19.

Developer Note: These changes aim to slightly worsen the conversion speed of higher Hitpoint targets, such as myth units or melee siege, while maintaining a similar or even speeding up the speed of lesser Hitpoint human soldiers.

• Fated Arrows (Technology): damage reduction per bounce reduced from -63.4% → -80%.

Developer Note: This should result in the maximum damage output increase being reduced from +50% → +24% when hitting 2 additional targets.

Persephone

• Underworld Invasion (God Power): adjusted as follows
  • Number of units spawned at base and per Town Center reduced from 30 → 25.
  • Maximum number of units reduced from 150 → 125.

Myth Units

• Siren (Persephone): adjusted as follows
  • Damage increased from 36 → 40 hack.
  • Lured unit target speed increased from 50% → 100%.
  • Hitpoints increased from 600 → 720.
  • Attack range increased from 0.1 → 1.5.
  • Lure minimum range increased from 1.0 → 1.5.
• Harpy (Demeter): hitpoints increased from 240 → 380.

Heroes

• Orpheus (Demeter): adjusted as follows
  • Ranged attack is now exclusive vs flying units.
  • Added a hand attack as the default attack, with the following stats:
    • 6 Hack damage, 1.2 attack interval, 12x bonus damage multiplier vs myth units.
  • Hitpoints increased from 180 → 195.
  • Hack armor increased from 35% → 40%.
  • Movement speed increased from 4.2 → 4.3.
• Icarus (Demeter): adjusted as follows
  • Ranged attack towards flying units adjusted to match the same stats as the normal ranged attack.
  • Movement speed reduced from 5.0 → 4.5.
  • Hack armor reduced from 25% → 10%.
  • Pierce armor increased from 25% → 35%.
  • Line of sight reduced from 20 → 18.
• King Midas (Demeter): adjusted as follows
  • Cost increased from 350 gold 5 favor → 400 gold 6 favor.
  • Recharge time reduced from 60 → 40 seconds.
  • Attack interval reduced from 1.15 → 1.1.
  • Damage bonus multiplier vs myth units increased from 6x → 7x.

Human Units

• Amazon Archer (Demeter): adjusted as follows
  • Attack range reduced from 24 → 22.
  • Line of sight reduced from 30 → 26.
  • Cost changed from 85 food 95 wood → 85 food 75 gold.
  • Damage reduced from 13 Pierce 1 Divine → 14 Pierce.

[EricTheRed283]

So what do people think of having a non-wood costing Archer with those stats?