Do we need bans in ranked?

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
1

Since the last patch, all I can face in ranked is people doing Zhu Xi zhu ge nu rush or jeanne d’arc, to be honest these two civs are right now just broken.

Some of the top professional players of this game has said than they need several nerfs because in the current state they are just broken.

Zhu ge nu rush by zhu xi is freaking crazy, they can get near 60 zhu ge nu in minute 10 and also be able to transition to farms at the same time.

I wouldn’t say anything else that hasn’t been said here about jeanne d’arc, the concept of the hero and the own hero is broken as hell, the only viable tactic against she is just not fight.

With all of this in the game right now, a ban system for ranked I think is necessary. People are just abusing of these broken mechanics, and if devs are going to last 2 months or more to fix these kind of things, a ban system that allows players to just ban these broken civs is necessary.

2

There are too few civs and they are too different to have bans atm IMO. At least for ladder play, I know a poll has been done, stats have been looked into and the majority of people basically only play 1 civ, maybe 2 civs. Having a ban would be way too detrimental and set a high barrier to entering ranked.

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3

This aim to fix what happens when new civs are dropped. I can see in each game zhu xi, jeanne, japanesse, etc… Jeanne and Zhu Xi are broken, I can guarantee that if bans exist, they will be banned in almost 9/10 games.

The people who only plays one or two civs aren’t from the last patch. Today I’ve lost like 5 matches that were all exactly the same match. Some dude spamming zhu ge nu as zhu xi and the others spamming knights as jeanne, and that’s all.

There is certainly nothing you can do against this, you can’t mass enough army to stop zhu ge if you are not english, and horsemen or archers got melt by this army.

I’ve played LoL in the past for 5 years, and when a hero or the combination of heroes were broken, they did some of these things:

  1. Deactivate that hero in ranked
  2. Drop a patch as soon as possible (1 week or less) to fix the issue.

But doing nothing or letting the meta “evolve” uncourages people to play. This game is much different from AoE II because each civ feels unique, and that’s why is harder to balance the game, but statistics are here, and professionals are here, and them all agree that these two civs need several nerfs.

EDIT: and in that case that you only play 1 civ, all you need to do is learn another, with 2 civs you will be covered from the situation where someone just bans the only civ you play. I am one of these people who play a few civs, I am in conqueror but I only play at conqueror level Abbasid and Japanese.

4

It is drastically easier to learn a new 2nd/3rd champion than it is to learn another AOE civ (also league has had 100+ champions for a long time).

Also the current AOE civs are far more balanced than league tends to be, even the strongest civs have like a 55% winrate (you are almost guaranteed to be losing because of factors other than the civ’s strength) where league champions would only get hotfixed/disabled when they have like 60+% winrates or gamebreaking bugs. (Also sadly Relic patches have to go through some lengthy Microsoft verification thing meaning they can’t really hotfix the game quickly)

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5

To be clear I am talking about team games. This 55% is from 1v1 statistics, in almost every game right now you can see a Zhu Xi or a jeanne, that’s why the percentage stays at 55%. If you could get the percentage of win of certain civs together then I am pretty sure that in not mirror matches, Jeanne+Zhu XI would be near 80% win rate.

Is as easy as just mass zhu ge and mass knights, no other civ can get to 60 zhu ge nu or archers or whatever at minute 10. These civs by their own are broken, but together is just an abuse.

6

Sadly we don’t have ranked stats, but even 2v2, the strongest combo is Jeanne + Zhu Xi which has a 63.5% winrate (though numbers need to be taken with a grain of salt because of lack of sample size), apparently Jeanne + Ayyubids or Abbasids or English are just as strong.

Frankly team games in general are currently not a main balance priority, so you get a lot of skewed stats and matchups (though you occasionally see some balance changes like wonder balance, chinese/fire lancer nerfs). Complaints about siege also largely come from team games just because it is such a different environment (and also typically a lower level of play on average).

7

You can take the numbers with a grain of salt, but the same civ has the better win rate in 1v1, the better win rate in combos (with zhu xi, the other one) and it has been said by pros that the civ (or just jeanne) is completely broken. The same with the Zhu Xi zhu ge rush.

A ban system would allow the community to just ban these civs and don’t let people play with OP civs in ranked.

In EGC and other tournaments there are bans, i think they must add bans also for ranked.

8

l mean I do agree Jeanne and Zhu Xi should (and almost certainly will) get nerfs in the January patch (though I would mention that pros don’t really consider Jeanne OP, but she is overtuned in every elo below like challenger 3).

Bans and map picks are way differnet for tournaments, because top level players are expected to be able to play more civs and maps, but the random silver player shouldn’t have to.

While in tournaments there are bans, you are also forced to play water maps, and forcing either of those things on the general playerbase would make a lot of people upset.

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9

A lot of people is also upset cause of the terrible matchmaking and these overtuned civs…

I was going to post screenshots of all the matches I’ve got today showing the crazy elo difference between teams. I’ve played 11 matches and lost 10, most of them because there was directly no balance between teams, or they were premade, and all playing zhu xi + jeanne, but one would fit since I’m uninstalling the game.

image

All the matches I’ve played today were like this (im in the left, losing). Matchmaking is broken, civs are broken, etc…

This does upset the community (since me, and more others are quitting the game since somedays is impossible to get a balanced match. When someone say something about this, the common response is “there are no enough player base to get balanced matches, so the game increases the elo window”.

That’s half true, most of these matches were found just 1 min before starting the search, but by the way, if the game can’t find a good match in 2 minutes just keep searching, don’t match me with people with around 300-400 more elo than me and premade.

I don’t care if I need to wait 7 minutes to get a decent match, but getting that insane matches and even don’t be capable of skip, because the first time you get a 3 min penalty, then a 30 min penalty. If I skipped all these matches I would have just played 3 matches in the whole afternoon.

A game is supposed to give fun to the people playing it, not just “pairing random people and let them play”. As an example, if you are a soccer team in a high school, you will match the same age of people to get a match. But if you have kids of 16 years old and they can’t find a match, you don’t pair them with 8 years old because “then the wait would be too long”. In these situations the more elo get a free win and the lower elo just get uncouraged to keep playing, since the game is pairing unfair.

If you get an unfair match ok, doesn’t matter, but again and again in the same afternoon? Man…

Definitively the player base of AoE4 would not increase because things like this keep happening 2 years before the game is released and a lot of people is just quitting the game.

Is sad because I think the game has a lot of potential, and I love AoE saga, but there are certain core problems that if they don’t get solved, more and more people would just quit the game.

10

I mean matchmaking issues and balance issues is a lot different things than civ bans (which don’t really resolve any of those issues).

That said team games have been notoriously unbalanced both balance and matchmaking-wise.

I’m no expert on this, but what I think happens is high elo players get in longer queues so their matchmaking queue sucks in people from a greater elo range even though you aren’t in a long queue (also are the displayed elos their 1v1 elo or team game elo?).

If you want balanced gameplay then you should play 1v1, team games are not very balanced. Also premades have a gigantic advantage (in part due to leavers but also communication and strategy) so playing by yourself in team games is generally a poor experience)

If you want to play team games, I strongly recommend hopping on an AOE4 discord or other place to find teammates to play with.

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11

Yeah I know that this is different from the op civs of the bans, just pointing that there are several problems in the game.

Yes, you could think that they were in a long queue and they mixed with me, but it’s not true, because of these things:

  1. Even if they are waiting for so long I am not, and my elo window shouldn’t be as wide to get paired with these dudes.
  2. I’ve played like 2 or 3 times again the same people, finish the match, matchmaking and 1 min before boom, the same people. So they were waiting as me, 1 min.
12

Interesting, are the elos that are in your screenshots for certain their team game elo, or is it 1v1 elos since I know they are separate.

That said I acknowledge the matchmaking is pretty meh, particularly for team games.

13

It is team elo. You have different elo for every number of players.

For example you can have 1300 elo in 2v2, 1100 in 1v1 and 1400 in 3v3.

My elo is between 1300-1500 in 3v3 and 4v4.

So, is not solo elo, not even team elo since the elo is different.

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14

In team qualifiers (especially in 4vs4) look for the best times (where there are more players) so you won’t have a very unbalanced MM in most games.

I am absolutely against banning civilizations. This is not LoL and learning new civs is a complex process and is putting a barrier to multiple players.

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15

An afternoon is in the peak players playing and see. To be honest I think that something must be broken with my account, it’s not normal the matchmaking I’m getting over and over again. It’s not like a few matches, i’m in a continuous loop of getting to conqueror then getting paired with low elos against very high elos, then I drop to diamond 1 and I start to get paired with diamonds/platinum and I get again in conqueror. And the loop restarts.

It’s not fun because there is a small bracket of time that I’m getting fair matches, then when I’ve lost like 200 points I get gold/platinum in front, I smash them and again to conq, where I will be paired with very very high elos AND low elo in my team till I’m in diamond 1/ platinum 3.

It’s not LoL but you can already ban maps, don’t forget that you have quick match to play the op civ of the moment, and ranked is what it is, ranked. If people want to play more casual there is quick match or custom.

But these overtuned civs must be out of the ranked until the patch isn’t launched…

16

they are not broken at all. They received the nerf needed. You just need to learn more of the game, buddy.

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17

Saying “you need to learn more about the game” is literally saying nothing. Everyone can learn more about the game and probably Beasty or any other pro player would win in a 1v2 to these players I’m facing abusing Zhu Xi+jeanne.

When a tactic is too easy and too effective in fact is broken.

You can see statistics and they say Jeanne is the better civ in any elo in any game mode, Zhu xi has also good win rate but that WR is from 1v1. The other user shared that in 2v2 Jeanne+Zhu Xi has 63% win rate.

18

I literally said something, what you mean is that I practically said nothing.

And yes. You need to learn more about the game, man. Zhu Xi and JOA are strong alright, but to the point of needing a ban mechanic for Them? No way.

Joan of Arc becomes an underwhelming french if the hero is killed (pretty easy in big fights) and Zhu ge nus are beefy archers who still get mauled by horsemans and armored units.

Just saw a video of a guy who fough almost 30 Zhu ge nus with 10 horseman and roughly 10 other archers and the fight got stalemated. Guess who lost more ressources?

You need to adapt. if you know a player goes Zhu xi then focus on cavalry and fast castle.

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19

Statistics can be a trap when trying to use them as facts. Beastyqt has 80% WR. should we ban him from tournaments?

Players don’t know how to do against those two civs and climbers (players who just play the most popular civs in order to climb the ranks) abuse those civs against people who fear those civs.
If you struggle to beat them, learn how to play against them.

im tired of beating JOA and im not even gold… if i can, you can.

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20

I don’t think banning civilizations will be healthy for the game long-term, this is not a MOBA game like Leage of legends were you have over 50+ heroes to chose from and it make no sense for regular ranked play among casual players for an Age game.

Best solution is to balance those who are too strong out.

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