I think asymmetrical balance would be the end of AOE II. The three games that came after it -Age of Mythoology, AOE III and IV- had asymmetrical balance and they didn’t become as popular. Since there’s room for new civilizations, I wonder what the developers could come up with that would kill this one.
The North American Native civilizations are completely absent, as of today. In a Rise of Nations forum, which features the Lakota people, I’ve read that the Lakota packed their buildings and moved across territories, in real life. Which, incidentally, is how the Mongols play in AOE IV. So if this game were to have the Lakota in an upcoming DLC, such playstile would be what I’m talking about. The “Castle with wheels” in the title of my post refers to this.
In point of fact, the Poles with their Folwark strive dangerously to asymmetrical balance. It’s okay to have something like a Monastery or University with a twist, or even an Unique Castle like the Krepost. But the Granary is one of the most essential buildings in the game. You have to leave it alone.
So, in this thread I’d like people to come up with ideas for new civilizations that would mean the end of AOE II. I don’t mean these civilizations to be broken -the Castle with wheels would be balanced-, but to have bonuses and mechanichs that would be completely out of place.
and completely against your point, starcraft 2 that is STILL the most successful RTS, basically only has asymmetrical balance aside from mirrors
the above mentioned games failed for other reasons. its like saying “mech commander and iron harvest both had mechs and thats why the games failed”
we might actually get this, but as a boat, that UU, might actually be able to garrison units to help it shoot, and might be a drop off point for fishing boats
i really dont see how. apparently 1st crusade and flemish revolution are more likely to have broken it, juddging by the uproar over LOTW vs DOTD
units that move and shoot. archers in dark age. cavalry available in feudal age that upgrades into knights in castle age (similar to the possible scout camel to the camel rider). mayan eagle warriors or a civ that doesnt need houses or a civ that has xbows that have 2 more range than SE onagers
Well, I never said that those three games falied BECAUSE asymmetrical balance. I only worded it in a way that implied it.
Yes, Starcraft came up in another topic when I shared this exact view. But the setting of the game matters. If it’s located in space, as the name suggests, it’s a good place for that kind of mechanich. I don’t want to look it up because I want YOU to tell me if what I’m imagining is correct.
Still, none of this invalidates what I propose in ths thread: ways of ruining AOE II.
That’s why, in the end, I clarified that I don’t mean for the civlizaitions to be broken, but out of place.
I always thought that the game engine didn’t allow for this. But it would be in line of what I proposed. Maybe a new Cavalry Archer faction, or maybe having given that bonus to Tatars. It would be the only one to feature these Cavalry Archers able to shoot while moving. To balance it, no foot Archers. There. Game ruined.
I don’t understand this one; Mayan already have Eagles.
He he he. Agree. However, the Huns never gave me that asymmetrical balance vibe.
A more expensive Granary that gives population room. It may seem like a small thing, but that’s how disasters come to happen. Next thing you know, Armenian’s Lumbercamps cost stone but produce Militia line.
These two wouldn’t be out of place, because it would be common to all, and because these tipe of units already exist. These two would be broken, which wasn’t the point of the thread.
Introduction to logical thinking:
“A and B are different in traits X and Y” cannot lead to the conclusion “X leads to Y”
BTW, rise of nations Lakota do not have packed buildings. They can construct buildings outside their national border (because they do not even have one).
“I didn’t say it I just implied it” Like uh, sure? That’s not helping anyone to agree with you.
The folwark is literally just a mill that is larger so that the civ’s farming bonus can work. Like they could have implemented the mechanic with normal mill and might have even tried, but it was probably too annoying to use.
So the deal is that as much as many people wouldn’t like civs that are too assymetrical/out of place, if its just one/ a few civ they just need not to play them. So to ruin AoE2 you would need to remake most civs.
I played a campaign made by a user (I can not remember the name of the campaign or user) that reflects in some aspects this Idea and it was fun.
In the campaign you pack your TC (you can only have one) and build all other buildings around, close to the resources, but if you needed to expand or move to get more resources, you needed to pack you TC and move, however all the buildings previously constructed are destroyed by themselves a short time later and you must build them again…
I don’t mind if you don’t agree with my thesis that asymmetrical balance ruined those games. The point of the thread is to throw around ideas that wouldn’t fit in this one.
However, I would also like to hear the “real” reasons why the other 3 falied, since I’m so wrong here. I’m guessing that in the case of Age of Mythology, it was the fact that different units occupy more house room? Yeah… people should be able to create 100 Minotaurs if they want to.
But it also has HOUSING ROOM. They did mean to set it apart from normal Mills.
Yeah, you have a point there. Feel free to bring asymmetry to all the other ones; I was only focusing on the new ones.
Sorry, but it doesn’t sound like a fun scenario. It seems like a zanny idea that the Forgotten Empires crew would come up with.
You should try the Campaign, it is called Vandals: Destroyers of Rome by PhillySouljah (Mods Single - Age of Empires )
For me, it was fun since it give me a different mode of play and resource management, however as I mentioned before, only for a campaign mode, but not for all other modes.
Just wait until you realise what Slavs military buildings do. Arguably the Folwark is even less assymetric than that because it costs exactly the cost of a mill + a house.
Exactly: the Slav team bonus doesn’t add a Wood cost to the military buildings. It’s a completely difrerent concept, and the Folwark is MORE asymmetric, not less, just for that reason.
Gee, it seems that I made a spectacularly uninteresting topic. People have avoided the proposal and cherry-picked harder than I’ve ever seen. And NO ONE has answered why the other 3 games failed; maybe it was really due to asymmetrical balance. The ones who denied that thesis haven’t presented a counter-argument.
Well no, the folwark is basically the same as building a mill + a house, while Slavs military buildings are not the same as building a military building + house.
I mean you’re the one who randomly decided that the mill was somehow one of the most important buildings and should be left alone, without further elaboration. Also the problem with you getting worked up over folwark is that you’re focusing on something actually not that big (it’s just a house+a mill that wouldn’t exist if farms were smaller) so you sound like you would get a heart attack if AoC was released today.
I mean it’s got one civ that skips the whole housing mechanic entirely, two civs that remove a whole building and all the units inside and cram their roles into one unit from another class, another one that replaces demo ship with a completely different kind of ships (and let’s not forget that the OG Korean SO was a better BBC+onager hybrid than the houfnice today) and one that gets a UU from its monastery.
Probably a tons of different factors contributed to that: how you define failure (because the other age titles still have a lot of fans today) being overshadowed by AoE2, whatever was going on at ES/MS, maybe less popular time period for AoE3, etc… So yes, no one is going to bring in a simple and straight answer.
You glossed over the SC counter argument just because it’s in space. So here is another one: AoE2 is more assymetric than AoE1, because of having UUs and more bonuses.
It’s one of the most important buildings in the game: you always have to have it, no matter what.
It should be left alone: tweaking it does create asymmetry. If the starting point if this thread is correct and asymmetry will ruin the game, logically, you should leave the Mill alone.
Taking out one kind of unit and providing another one is not asymmetric. It doesn’t affect the core of the civilization that much. That’s why I said that “you have to leave the Mill alone”. The more profound the change, the more you strive to asymmetry. The Missionary has no impact whatsoever in this area because the Monastery is far from essential.
Now, what the American civilizations do is replacing horses with an infantry unit that behaves similarily. Every other military unit stays the same. If they didn’t have Eagle Warriors, but all of their other military had more pierce armor and ran faster, THAT would be in line of what I percieve as dangerous.
I concede that the Huns are close to what I’ve described as the downfall of the game. Not building houses and having a more expensive Mill that provides housing room are quite on the same level. But it has to be noted that the Folwark automatically colects a percentage of a Farm as soon as it’s built. The sum of it all surpasses the Hun’s bonus in terms of radical changes.
By the way, I’ll have a digression and say, why can’t people say “original”? How come you need to abrbreviate it? It’s just one word!!!
Finally I have the confirmation I needed. Thank you for that. So, it’s in space, and I’m guessiong that 40% or 50% of the units you control move through the air? There you have it. It’s a completely different game, a completely different feeling, and it’s a setting that allows for asymmetrical balance to fit in.
Maybe it’s more, but it’s not asymmetrical in an absolute scale. The Castle is common to all civilizations; the Unique Units are just a touch of diversity.
I’m not sure how anyone would prove any hypothesised reason for AoE 4’s lower player count. It’s not even clear it actually has a lower player count, as we don’t know if the proportion of people playing the Xbox version differs between 2 and 4. It’s not really that much more asymmetrical than 2, IMO. You have units common to many civs, just like 2, unique units just like 2, civ bonuses just like 2. Some civs can do some things earlier than others, but that’s in 2 as well. Some people have complained about how similar the civs are. Many people have complained about a wide variety of aspects of 4, but it’s impossible to know to what extent you have a small number of vocal people complaining about each thing. There are, of course, also people who complain about many aspects of 2. If I were to pick the things that I’ve seen the most complaints about for AoE 4, they’d be:
The lack of micro because you can’t dodge arrows.
The dominance of siege vs siege in the late game.
The inability to zoom out more. There’s nothing to address this on the roadmap, so the devs implicitly said to people “if you don’t like it, go and play something else”, so large numbers of people did.
The price, quantity of content, and maturity of QoL features relative to 2 DE.
The style of the graphics, though this can be addressed reasonably well using ReShade.
I can’t recall ever seeing anyone complain that the civs in 4 need to be made more similar.
Lakota: All of their buildings can be packed. But their Castle can move around without needing to be packed; that means it’s still functioning while moving. To balance: no horses, of course, being an Amercain civilization, and also every other bulding has 1/10 of HP.
Basques: they are people in the north of Spain. They have a reputation for their dairy products, in real life. So: Town Centers produce Cows. These Cows have to be asigned to unit-creation buildings, like Barrack, Stables and Town Centers themselves. That’s the only way to gather Food for the Basques: they have no Farms and their Villagers are unable to work on bushes or sheeps.
Fasten your seatbelts because here comes the idea that will ruin AOE II. It’s the Mapuches. They were a tribe in Southern Chile and Argentina. They only have one building. Yes, one: the Toldería. It provides 20 population, trains military units, and serves as a dropsite. They have 4 Unitque Units: one that steals resources from the enemy; one who is invisible unless atacking; an Archer who deals Melee damage and a Monk who doesn’t convert, but throws poisonous darts.
