OTOH, if everyone build 0 HC because they’re too expensive, and you also build 0, your advantage is 0.
but if everyone builds 8HC and you build 10, your advantage is 2HC.
A discount on Archers is arguably stronger than a discount on CA, because archers are cheaper.
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I guess the real thing which matters is the strength the unit per se. Archers are much better than CAs for the majority of the civs, so an archer discount should be better.
My point was that it is better a discount on what is expensive.
Ofc it may happen that only the Italian HC becomes cost effective VS, say, cavaliers, while the other HCs are not…
I think the issue here is that Hand Cannons and Camels are designed to be exactly that, gold intensive support/counter units.
If that’s in fact the design, then what they should do is be effective counter units that do a better job then their trash counterparts. Camels are better then halbs in most situations, the clear drawback being gold cost. The thing is there isn’t really a infantry trash counter to compare HC to other then maybe skirms, which HC clearly out preform. So then we end up comparing HC to Arbs. Arbs are a primary unit, so HC shouldn’t outperform arbs in all scenarios, but there should be situations where HC are the better choice then Arbs as a support unit.
I think it can be argued that in some situations HC are already the better choice. So I’d say either a slight buff to HP, TT, or bonus damage v infantry is the way to go.
In AOK thumb ring didn’t exist and the gap beetwen FU arabalest and HC wasn’t as large.
Maybe originally hc wretn intended to be outclassed by the margin they are.
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In AoC they added tons of techs to buff CAs so I don’t see why they wouldn’t have done the same if they felt removing the hand cannon tech wasn’t enough tho.
To be honest, AoC was brutally unbalanced.
The original Aztecs alone were almost unbeatable, and the Conquistador was way too strong even by UU standards.
AoC also took down Franks and Byzantines with brutal efficiency. There was no point playing Franks when Huns did everything they did, better, and with more options.
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Aoc also started the knights and crossbow meta with bloodlines and thing rings. Skirms also didn’t do bonus damage to pikemen. Infatry was more important than and relatively stronger, which made the HC also more relevant.
(Frank’s paladins thought wee outright broken, byz basically had full tech tree, etc. So many more severe problems)
A buff to projectile speed is adequate. Make it equal to arrows.
I feel too much should not be changed at once.
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Whatever happened to this thread? People forgot about it? Almost everyone agrees the HC is subpar and there’s tons to support its inadequacy.
From the waning of infantry, to the buffing of cavalry and archers with no changes to HCs.
Even to the apparently lower effective accuracy compared to pre - DE.
I really like the idea of making it like the leitis. Ignores armour (except buildings). Reduce damage by 2 or whatever if necessary…
But if not then should at least get a massive buff to killing rams due to their abysmal ROF and accuracy leaving them even harder countered by rams and making it even more unrealistic that bullets can’t kill the crew pushing the ram.
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They do currently get 2 bonus damage against rams. This should leave them doing more dps vs rams compared with arbs.
The catch is that siege rams have 2 ram armour. I don’t know who thought that’d be a good idea. The ram armour negates almost all the bonus damage most imperial-age units do. As if civs with siege ram need another reason to get the upgrade.
Anyway if this ram armour is removed HCs will be less countered by rams than archers are.
BTW in my mod I gave HC +15 hp (35->50). It’s not enough, as far as I can tell. They also need a dps increase (probably from fire rate).
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They need less frame delay among with chemistry upgrade time reduced.
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Unpacked trebs also use ram armor type, which is probably why such a peculiar bonus damage exists. If you buff HC, don’t forget that they are very similar to chu-ko-nu. They have roughly the same damage, same cost, same attack speed, but are held back by their low hp, accuracy and lack of ballistics. So this comparison imo makes a good anchor point for balancing.
They have the exact same attack animation as arbalesters, the “frame delay” stat has no direct impact on gameplay.
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You telling me that… well open the game, HD and DE test the scenario, HC usually can fire back after two steps back in older versions, test the DE HC it needs 3 or even 4 steps to fire back, the same to the cav archer, it looks with lag like if they are trying but they don’t, during that momentum they just die.
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I didn’t understand anything about steps. Seems like an unconventional approach for explaining AoE 2 mechanics. In a scenario with arbalesters and HC in the same control group both attack at the same time after the order is issued, which means that their animations lengths are the same (and yes, I’ve checked that). Obviously, HC have much longer attack interval, but this has no relation the frame delay either.
HCs are clearly underpowered, watch the SOTL video where he also calls for a buff, if HCs are to be balanced, and actually be effective vs (moving) infantry.
Not to mention many other pros also calling HCs underwhelming.
Correct, HCs will still be underpowered even if they get 50HP.
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Hey man! Welcome back!
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As sporty said they do have the same effective frame delay. It’s only the low ROF. Which i think is ok and sets it apart (besides the realism) but then they need to be buffed accordingly.
I didn’t realise they were that similar. I’ll have to have another look.
Unless the wiki is wrong, the HC has a worse ROF and costs much more and has a much slower projectile.
On top of the other disadvantages.
But no ballistics + slower projectile hurts them even more.
Isn’t it super ironic that a bullet travels slower than an arrow in AOE…
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They should be doing a lot more damage to rams anyway. HC RIF firing at 3.45. An arb fires at something like 1.8. So even with 2 ram damage they’re not doing near to double the dps to rams due to bad ROF.
But on top of that it’s always been super weird that there’s archers that do tons more damage to rams (kipchaks and chukonu all do 3 damage per extra arrow)
A ram should block arrows not bullets. Yet another mad balance design in aoe…
Don’t forget about Fast Imp strategy on Arena. How are you going to defend against hypothetical 62 hp 20 damage HC with castle age military?
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With Knights. (20 characters). One strategy on one single map should never prevent to balance x and y
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