After watching the Genesis tournament and seeing no HRE picks, I began to think about several changes that could be made to the HRE roster.
I think what they lack the most is map presence in the early stages of the game. Almost every civ has some way to go out on the map in feudal age. For exemple, France has self healing knights, rus also has knights and can hide hunting cabins to generate gold, Delhi can make use of sacred site captures to take the fight away from their town and Mongol can double produce units.
From what Iâve seen, HRE has no special mechanics that allows them to have a presence on the map and that is what I think should be changed. So here are my proposals :
Transfer the ââForced Marchââ upgrade from Delhi to HRE. This change would give a way to infantry which should be the core of an HRE army to move faster on the map and better respond to enemy movements early in the game.
Transfer the speed upgrade for monks from Delhi to HRE. In my opinion, Delhi should have upgrades on scholars that would synergize better with their role. I donât think they need the movement speed if they are used to heal slow elephants for example. They could use some better healing capacity to keep those costly elephants alive, or an upgrade to increase their research buff when garrisoned in a mosque for example. Prelates need to be with the HRE army to inspire them but their movement speed limits the potential for an HRE player to quickly respond to enemy movement.
I am sure many more changes could be interesting, but I would like to test these 2 and see how a more mobile HRE infantry army could fare on the battlefield. What are your thoughts on these to proposed changes?
HRE already get an infantry speed bonus, but you are right. Their early game is lacking compared to other civilizations. A slight increase to their existing speed boost, even 5% more would help greatly. I am very iffy on buffing the HRE too much because the civ is by no means an F tier. Perhaps they could also streamline some of the tech, I mean how often to people get the prelate inspire build speed bonus from the monastery? I would expect a build speed bonus to be available to those under the effect of the prelate from the get go.
I think HRE is overall a very solidly designed civ.
The 40% boosted economy is their âspecial mechanicâ to get presence.
The only issue they face rn to make them not S/A tier is that knight opener into archers give the oponent momentum and is overall the way better unit composition to play and take engagements with compared to spear/archer feudal into MAA castle if you survive and didnât do horrible trades.
If french wouldnât be that meta rn, HRE would automatically go up a tier for sure.
This is very true, if only there was early crossbows; it would be a great addition to the game to help provide another form of counter against knights and MAA feudal rush.
I agree with both of you. I donât think a buff is what is needed since the game just came out and people are still figuring out the game.
My point is that I donât feel like HRE has mechanics that allows them to go on the map and threaten the opposing playerâs plan. HRE feudal gameplay feels too passive which is not necessarily a good thing in my opinion. Just stay in your town with your buffed villagers and hope you can make it to castle age! I would love to have a way to interact more with the opposing player besides trying not to lose villagers left and right.
Thatâs why I was talking about a speed increase so you can go out on the map and not get punished for getting out of your town.
They definitely need something for early game, cheaper towers with half cost emplacements could be an idea to maintain their defensive role. Monks picking up relics in Feudal would be nice too.
I think that could be great too if instead of going for a more agressive gameplay, HRE changes built on their defensive capabilities.
They already have a discount for outpost emplacements but I think an outpost discount could be interesting. My only concern is that it would be used to tower rush the enemy.
I also think giving prelates the ability to pickup relics in feudal age could be interesting so they could be garrisoned in outposts. Again, my only concern would be that it would give HRE to much of a gold income boost. Maybe adding an upgrade to the monastary allowing relics garrisoned in an outpost, keep or dock to generate gold in the castle age could be a fix?
I kind of think that prelates should just start the game with their extra health and better healing upgrades, that way HRE might consider taking them into combat early game. Also make them benefit from increase march speed upgrade so they donât get left behind by infantry.
Iâm not convinced HRE is actually bad. Itâs just that they have this bug where prelates wont inspire and it ruins their entire thing. So we will have to see what happens when it get fixed some time in 2022
Agreed. I was unaware that HRE were considered so inferior to other civs until I started looking into how to play them better (only to come across all the criticism). I think they are very solid once the prelate inspire bug is fixed because it really does negate any early game advantage for HRE.
HRE late game is just as good as anyone else. If I could pick ONE and only one buff for them it would be to allow monks to capture relics in Feudal Age. Whether or not they can be stashed until the Castle Age wouldnât matter. But because HRE late game is so dependent on getting those relics captured, it is something you can stockpile in Feudal Age in preparation for Castle Age.
Yeah, it is honestly hard enough to defend every single relic by the third age, especially if the HRE player is doing a fast castle into Reg cathedral with 3 prelates to camping relics as you transition. The issue isnât needing relics, problem is not having any major early bonuses apart from slightly cheaper blacksmith upgrades and buggy prelates.
Itâs not that crazy, really. Some civs have age 3 units/abilities in age 2. HRE donât have anything significant in terms of advanced or unique units early in the game. The ability to pick up a relic early on, even if you canât do anything with it, can change the way opponents have to play against HRE. They might think twice about going all in on a rush, for example, in favor of defending and securing their own relics.
Since the late game HRE is so dependent on securing relics, and since the emphasis for this civ is on prelates/religion in general, it doesnât seem out of line in my opinion to allow early access to relics.
Anything that moves the action to the rest of the map is a good thing to me. Gameplay wise, I think it would be fun to have fights for securing relics early in the game instead of only trying to snipe or keep villagers alive.
I think they should take of the landsknecht and make the spearman the new landskencht wich menas he will be able to figth inf and be the counter for cav and will be countert by arrows and crossbows. But he should get the ability run to catch his counter maybe somtimes. ( He should get his techs like know and get by start 1dmg and 1 of each armor extra and maybe a attak boost if he is in a group of 10 or more in the later ages. The monk should have the ability to take relics in the 2 age instead of the army buffs so you are able to get the relics