I still find that HRE struggles to keep up on feudal age especially against French early rush. I often think that without reaching castle age safely I can not counter English or French which kind of makes all players think playing HRE vs English or French you opponent already have the upper hand. To overcome this problem I have some recommendations. People who play AOM would find these helpful and reasonable to gameplay of HRE.
Make towers cheaper for HRE. HRE can’t keep up vs Longbow rush or Knight rush this would help them a lot as Egyptians in AOM. Egyptians in AOM also can’t do much in 2nd age and rely on their towers for defense.
Make Prelates boost Drop points which will effect a villager. Instead of focusing on Villagers, this way when all army is called to one point prelates wouldn’t leave their boosting spots.
Respecting all except who oppose without reasoning, or flaming.
The emplacements on HRE outposts are actually 25% cheaper than other civs, but i personally think the problem is more with the French and English being too oppresive.
Biggest issue with HRE they run out of food very quickly. And they can’t secure their food source with units that are avilable to them. All counter units are food intensive e.g horsemen, spears and MAA. They don’t get any production bonus to match up enemy production rate. I see a lot of potential in HRE feudal but it just takes a little too long to get up and your based is rammed to hell at that point. E.g you can go 2 TC very fast but will take so much time to get out units to defend it. You can even get down 3 TC by 6:30 min if you are playing team games.
I don’t like the way HRE is designed, it can be only weak or OP.
Their eco boost from the prelate is insane, Reignitz is very strong (more balanced now however), and the printer is game breaking.
Even if you’re a late game civ, you can’t let HRE do his thing. So the strat is just don’t let them get there, and rush him
So there are two possibilities :
Or the other civs can kill HRE before, and in this case it’s too weak (actually state of the game vs French/English), or you buff them to allow them to defend early rush, and in this case nothing could stop him, so HRE would be OP.
IMO, to get out of this alternatives, I would reduce the prelate buff, nerf swabia a bit, and in exchange, change emergency repair, for some “emergency production boost”, so they don’t die in early game.
I also struggle a lot playing HRE vs french or english
When I face them it’s almost lost. (except when I chain loose to lower elo)
I think good changes would be to make prelate usefull for military purposes, right you only use them for boosting eco, make prelate able to play a military role in in feudal age would be a nice change that will keep the identity of HRE and make more viable.
Boosting units ? heal faster ? boosting military building ?
Anyway the military boosting that you can unlock in the next age is never used.
Chinese can use imperial officer to produce faster, delhi can put monks in building and for HRE, well you just pray.
And globally the same problem remains, there is only on strategy viable with landmark, (except for age 2) for others reignitz / swabia, sometimes you build burgrave palace
Basically go wheelbarrow, Aachen chapel, Fast Castle. Build 1-2 Towers for defense and get Burgrave palace. Kill him with castle age MAA with speed upgrade, range armor upgrade and rams. If he is going lots of MAA as well, get the +6 attack upgrade vs heavy for your MAA.
The key is that you need to get to castle age fast, and you need to kill him in early castle age.
Against French it is harder. I think FC or even worse fast Imperial is suicide.
I have the most success when I get a barrack and a stable immediately upon reaching feudal, for spearman/horseman. Then get a second TC. If he doing a feudal all-in you need 2 barrack and 2 stables and some upgraded towers. Stay on the defense and then get to castle age.
In Castle age get a third TC. Then mass up MAA/Spear/Horseman/Mangonels and kill him with a large push in late castle age.
HRE has an overall winrate of 55 % against English. It has a clearly positive winrate for every skill level. Please take a look into the stats (takes 1 minute) before starting something that isn’t backed in any sense by the data available.