the game on land maps is complex enough
people don’t complain that land maps don’t allow for skill expression, or say that water maps add necessary variety
in fact almost all opinions i see of them are negative
so why are we forced to play them if barely anybody likes them?
specifically:
imo ranked would be better without those
I like when water is in the center of the map, so Med and Highlands. I don’t like Anatolia and other maps where water is only on the edge of the map.
In retold, I find water maps very interesting.
The new water system for AoMR I love. All 3 warship types buildable in Age II and with Fishing gather rates lower early on so losing water isn’t as bad as it once was. I really enjoy seeing videos of top players playing on Mediterranean map for example.
I don’t think there’s ever been an RTS where people liked water maps. They are good for impression and single player though.
For example Comamnd & Conquer Red Alert 2 - it just works how it should be
It is imprtant to note, that AI in skirmish is completetly broken on water maps
Water maps should be bannable. Most players do not enjoy them. I don’t see why Age games keep making the mistake of having them in Ranked.
AoM has more potential to make water actually fun then any of the AoE games because of it’s setting.
The core problem with water is that once you lose control over it it’s really hard to get back onto water again. Water is also very snowbally because there are no walls or other defences that could slow down an attacking force.
But AoM has a setting that allows amphibious and flying units. So you can have units that can be trained in safety of the land that could give you a chance to fight back.
But currently AoM has no amphibious units besides Titans and there aren’t many flying units. Greeks have no fighting flying unit and some other Major Gods also don’t have access to any.
Anther strange thing about water is that there are water myth units but no water Heroes (besides 1 unit) so normal ships get bonus damage vs. Myth units.
That completely destroys the counter system that Myth units, Heroes and Human Units have on land.
Everyone should have access to water Heroes.
I think variaty is nessesary. Also, skill involves using the water or not. The choices you make during a game where it is possible to make ships.
They’re pretty fun. There is a lot more you can do for water compared to AoE games.
Age of mythology definitely needs hero ships beyond the Argo. It doesn’t feel right without them, and I’m not a fan of heroic fleet.
Most People seem to be unable to learn more than one build order at once, that’s why they don’t like water maps.
I’d make the map pool 50% land and 50% water, so a player will be be forced to learn another build order instead of making the same braindead execution 70/80% of the time.
Also, these new devs have decided to nerf the range of the siege ships out of nowhere, so people barely make docks anymore on water maps without fish like Watering Hole.
These are some of the worst ideas ever posted on these forums. All water maps should be bannable. There should be at most 1-2 in the entire pool.
All of your suggestions here would kill the game quickly. Also, having ships on water maps without fish was one of the worst mechanics in any RTS game, since the boats could just kill all land units from the water.
The vast majority of players do not enjoy water maps in Ranked. Forcing them on the playerbase will just make people quit or not touch ranked.
There are 0 water maps in Unranked, because the developers know that most players do not like them.
I’ve noticed that, most of the time, are the EE players who don’t like water maps, most ESO players wouldn’t mind playing water maps at all.
In general, the EE playerbase is younger, some of them weren’t even born during the good ESO days, I doubt that their tiktok brain could process two things at once, indeed.
There should always be at least 1 water map in ranked map pool that someone has to play. Someone shouldn’t be able to do the same things over and over again they should be made to have to go out of their comfort zone once in a while to show how good they really are.
I used to play ranked in RTS games but no more because I hated playing the meta so much I wanting to do more things. Variety is the spice of life but a good amount of RTS players hate variety in maps (Land, water and hybrid) 
If it was totally up to players most would just play on 1 or 2 maps because most seem to want to stick to doing the same things over and over again.
Agree, I hate water and never make a boat in any game including AOE2, AOE3 and AOM, if my opponent makes boats then oh well I guess I lose.
It’s because water makes an already difficult game even more complicated to play. Water just makes the game less casual and more hardcore. Ranked needs more players not less.
Casual players don’t tend to like playing ranked much either way they like playing either single player or lobby games if they do play multiplayer games.
Anyone who does enjoys water maps would be forced to play lobby games if they wanted to ever play water maps if there was no water maps in ranked which wouldn’t be good for such players.
I am a example of someone who got sick of ranked games in RTS because the meta in ranked games gets boring. I enjoyed water maps once in a while to spice things up. If there never was any water before I would of gotten tired of ranked faster. I also enjoy watching pros play water maps which would be very rare to see if their was no water maps in ranked.
People who like playing ranked for a challenge but then don’t ever want a challenge of learning and playing water and want unlimited map bans so they play only whatever few maps they want to play makes no sense at all to me.
It’s good that Mediterranean was removed from the map pool. It’s been around for way too long. The map it was replaced with is Megalopolis which seems a lot more fun.
I’m not against having 1-2 water maps in the pool, but they should be something more interesting than Highland for example. Archipelago for example could be interesting.
Water maps should be in quick and ranked games, always, BUT there ahould be a banning system in both of them.
Just like Aoe4. You like it ? Leave it . Dont like it? Ban them. And thats it.
I enjoy water maps and they are my noob stomp so im good with them. Hope they add migration in ranked, I need to go 1700 fast 