So after this Genesis age of empire 4 tournament this week-end we could get more info about the balance of each civ and seeing some pattern and thats interesting to see that french we all thinking was the most broken of all have actually one of the lowest winrate, we also see that on 8 civ only 6 was played chinese,and holy roman empire were not played a single time.
So here for the stats: (i dont count the mirror matchup)
Of all civ Mongol and french was the most played by far
French played 12 game (24 if we count french mirror) and win only 3 for 9 losing that’s a 25 % winrate
Mongol played 13 game and win 11 game for 2 losing that’s a 84.62% winrate
Rest of the civ have an equal presence with :
Rus played 7 game win only 1 game and losing 6 that’s a 14.29% winrate
English played 6 game and win 4 for losing 2 that’s a 66.67% winrate
India played 5 game and win 2 for losing 3 losing that’s a 40% winrate
And arabian played 5 game (7 if we count mirror) and win 3 for losing 2 that’s a 60% winrate
So if we made the list about winrate in the order from the best to the worst :
Mongol : with a 85% winrate
English : with a 67% winrate
Arabian : with a 60% winrate
India : with a 40% winrate
French: with a 25% winrate
Rus :with the lowest winrate of all : 14% winrate
Would be interested to hear your opinion of what balance change you would make after seeing these stats also what type of change could make chinese and holy roman empire more presence in game ?
(as asked by your answer i add also the mirror match up in the tourney theyr was 6 french mirror match up so french where picked 24 time during the tourney. and one arabian mirror so we see 7 arabian pick during the tourney )
I dont really play mongols but I think their trade boom could be tweaked a bit
When it comes to french just their age 2 hulk that needs moving to age 3 and replaced with a galley cuz their water is still ridiculously strong and just modifying the hulk could lead to the civ being too weak on water instead.
China seems to need some sort of buff as it seems quite weak atm
Thanks for posting this information. I am definitely surprised that French saw such little success against other civs and that seems to imply that at least some of its power came from the fact that the civ is a little more simple than the others. It’s possible that as a result of this simplicity the meta/optimal playstyle was easier to figure out for this civ which led to more early success. edit Alternatively it could also allude to professional players preparing specific strategies in order to stand a chance against the civ. Could you include the number of games in which there was a French mirror? I think that it is also a relevant tournament stat when discussing win rates and games played. The Mongols seem to have taken the tournament by storm compared to how much play they saw in the qualifiers and the quarters. English seem strong, I’m surprised they didn’t see more play. Early relic play seems to be a viable option for the Delhi and I didn’t catch any Abbasid games yet (I’ll edit once I have). I am a little disappointed that neither Chinese nor HRE saw play (the later having a deadly feudal ram push and dangerous castle timing). In my opinion the lack of play seen by the Chinese and HRE may also relate to the difficulty/complexity of the civs. Maybe its too early to say which civs are stronger than others???
p.s. I do believe professional play is a good indicator of civ strength but as always not all balance should be made off of professional play alone.
No one played HRE or China? Ouch, such underdogs it would seem. The french having a low winrate doesn’t surprise. Their early game is as one dimensional as the HRE just using knights instead of infantry. Not to mention everyone probably practicing to counter the French due to the sheer number of its players.
I don’t think you can learn a lot about balance from a sample of 5-12 games per civ, and even in this small sample a lot of the wins were due to running into an unexpected, and unpracticed against, strategies, skill gap and even just unfortunate decision making like the final game.
I am sure Relic looks at each of these players last 200 games and use that data to make better informed decisions than just what we have seen in the tournament.
I think the reason France didn’t shine as bright is that the top players practiced specifically to be able to beat France with at least 2-3 other civs, while nobody had time to practice any of these counters as France since these counters weren’t in the wild. So when they did play as France they mostly used the tried and true tactics of knight harass, but that’s not the only strength of France, far from it.
That said, China and HRE could probably use a buff just so they get representation in top level play.
Balance in any game ever, will be made based on professional players.
Full time professional players spend weeks developing strategies for tournament, which over time… trickle down and become known by the average player.
Yes you may say, it takes someone who literally gets paid to play and is top 8 in the world developing a strategy just to beat the civ, but in 6 months time everyone will be doing the strategy they came up with.
This is why balance patches shouldn’t be released quickly
I dont know for the mongol theyr trade is strong yes but actually its theyr only good eco bonus compared to other civ. And when you see theyr unit they have nothing particularly strong,nobody use mangudai for exemple and most mongol player use just the standard unit everyone have access too, so i dont really see what make them that strong right now exepth they have way less thing to manage compared to other civ
i dont take account about any mirror for my stats. the stats come from one civ is against an other civ,so no mirror coz i don’t see the points to add these for the winrate
After watching a few games from this tournament, I think it’s not about balance changes that people need to worry about, but the fact that the gameplay is boring. There’s not much going on and most matches end with 1 fight. It pales in comparison with AoE2, whether you like it or not, and it’s also slower, contrary to what was said so many times, the reality is that AoE4 is just way slower and barely anything happens. It’s a borefest to watch.
I think the town center is bit too powerful early game and its nuliffy too much agression in early stage of the game who make feel aoe2 more agressive but overall aoe 2 game have longer duration than aoe4 game.
Another reason for French low success could be « controled environment » as Aussie Drongo said. Players chose their civ according to the map and which civs they were the most likely to face based on the available civs of their opponent.
Also, if someone won with France, they would not be able to play the civ again in the same series. I see this as potentially biasing the winrate since stonger french players would only get to play them once while a weaker french player could play them several times.
The last section of my post is more of a caution to take the tournament with a grain of salt. As you mentioned the pro’s strategies will filter into the public and once this happens; through a combination of experience gained in our own matches and our experience watching professional play we will get a better grip on the balance of the game and the strength of the civs. I just hope that if/when changes are made they are made conservatively.
TheViper (winner of this tournament) said that the low winrate stems from the fact that absolutely every player knew this civ will be picked and has prepared a counter strategy against them.
So balance-wise this civ is picked far too often and indicates the need for a nerf.
Not when you watch the Snek play, often loses its entire army and still won’t die.
Had many great comebacks in these matches, others would have simply resigned.
