since Goths tend to struggle quite a bit, it would be nice to slightly boost their strenght without changing their identity.
They basically have 2 problems:
Their early game is a bit underwhelming. It’s actually not terrible, as they at least have some kind of eco bonus, but the free vill from not having to spend 25 sec on Loom kicks in quite late and isn’t that meaningfull then anymore. Their tech tree is not bad up to Castle Age either. The problem is, that they’re not really good at anything until late Castle Age and it’s quite hard to get there without being behind.
If they get to their desired lategame fantasy, they still struggle in quite a lot of matchups, mainly against strong infantry civs, who can match their infantry strength and usually have better support units. So quite often it’s not so much about surviving until the matchups turns in your favour, but rather surviving and then realizing that thing still aren’t looking too easy. To be fair: There are also quite some matchups, where Goths actually are very strong in the lategame.
My idea to boost them a little bit:
+10 max pop in Imperial Age → +5 pop-space and +5 max pop per Age
(so the current bonus is staggered from +5 in Dark Age to +20 in Imperial Age and you also get the equivalent of a free house per Age)
This would be another small boost for their early game, where max pop doesn’t matter yet, but one less house that needs to be built gives them a tiny bit more wood and villagers time to operate with for aggressive strategies. The only worrying thing is that their Drush might become extremely strong, since they can get it even earlier with this change and also easily afford 3 Militia because of the cost reduction they have. But since their late Feudal and early Castle Age play is still basically as bad as it was before, I’d say a better power spike in Dark Age isn’t too bad.
It also affects lategame, where they get 10 more pop to play with (so 220 overall), which should be a bit more significant. My idea is, that it gives Goths a bit more room to actually outmass other Infantry civs. This is again just a slight boost (which basically has been suggested before in the way of changing the bonus to +10% max pop space), but I think that’s all Goths need. Potentially worrying thing here is, that i could turn matchups where Goths are already favored into even more of a nightmare. But I think those matchups are usually about not letting Goths get to 200+ pop anyway. So probably nothing would really change there.
A last thing to worry about is how that would affect low elo gameplay, which I can’t really judge that well. I heard people there usually have a hard time stopping Goths anyway, so maybe it would be better to leave them as a noob-friendly (or however you want to call it) civ, which isn’t that great at higher levels of play. But maybe those changes also wouldn’t affect things there too much, since build orders aren’t sharp enough for those small savings early to make a difference. Can’t really tell for the extra pop in lategame.
I think this could work yeah, even though I still think Goths need a bit more diverse tech tree because they don’t have any eco bonus after the instant loom and boar bonus, something like Thumb Ring or even Plate Barding lol, could help too.
+5/5/10 feudal/castle/ imperial. Same end result while avoiding the early potentially being too strong.
I don’t think it’s a bad idea. Think it’s probably more identity than simply giving them FU cavalier and more importantly FU hussar
If they’re getting barding, then remove hussar
And if they’re getting TR, then maybe remove HCA, otherwise they’ll potentially use HCA to counter the infantry of infantry civs. Not saying they’ll be OP. But potentially why they don’t have TR. Makes CA an easy go to option(like how Bulgarians do it)
This thread keeps getting perpetually reincarnated, and for good reason.
Yeah, I’m kind of amazed by how often people don’t seem to know/acknowledge this. Outside of Low Elo Legends, the “Unstoppable Goth Flood” is more myth than reality.
I think the pop/housing bonus is reasonable. If anything it may be a little weak.
I’ve never been a fan of proposals to just give the Goths more Archer/Cav tech. Sure it gives them more “options,” but if the opponent can get the Goth player to invest heavily into something they have no particular strength in, I say that’s a net win for the non-Goth. That’s why it’s sad when Goths have to go heavy into Hand Cannons against a civ with better infantry.
Seems like a solid idea, and I like that it guarantees it will be used as a military (and specifically infantry) bonus.
That’s antoher interesting idea. It only adresses the lategame issue though. For early game it does basically nothing. So I’d still like my suggestion better.
Same thing here: Only adresses the lategame issue, but changes nothing for early game.
I don’t think so. Teamgame is a lot about cav and archers and Goths are not good at either of them. So they’re not great in teamgames to begin with.
Of course giving them the option to do a bit more in teamgames in lategame would buff them there, but since they’re on the underwhelming side there as well, that should be no problem - actually the opposite: A good thing.
Their Skirms are already perfectly viable in all stages of the game if needed and they have a UU against archers. Buffing Skirms for them seems weird to me.
My suggested changes would also help a tiny bit vs archer civs anyway, since their early game would become a bit better, giving them a bit more ress (50 wood and some villager time) to work with.
I liked the idea. But why not flat +10 pop space from Dark age? So you can just skip the first 2 houses and can go to sheep immediately after the game starts.
But, it is their identity. Weak until imperial when they unleash their strength… Always was the original devs intention and I like the concept.
What i don’t like too much is the implementation of this concept.
I’d remove the infantry bonus against buildings and replace it for double the effect of garrisoned units in siege, or Rams and Siege towers can garrisone double of units (Same effect). This synergizes well with infantry, and the goth’s overpopulation capacity.
Another possible change, could be replace the boar bonus for this new: -60% Tower’s stone cost is replaced with wood (125w 50s final cost)
Maybe could make goth trush too strong but ,wise balanced, Goths can go trush to delay the enemy, or to defense itself during feudal and early Castle age. Both helps to reach Imperial Age without being an economic bonus by itself.
Maybe Masonry and Architecture could be removed for balance. Plus lacking Tower upgrades make it inefficient in late game
i like the increased pop space, it would help with infantry inherent pop ineficciency by giving you space for numbers.
i do not think their eco is that bad. after all they have the boar bonus and 1 extra vil, which is something many civs do not have and still perform better (like bizantines or magyars). what they lack are tech tree options. so maybe giving them thumb ring could already do something great for the civ. after all, many infantry civ have FU arbalest or close to it (japanese, dravidians, vikings…) so a thumb ringed crossbow would not be something new. people already play goths as a archer civ in castle age aniway
another options could simply look more at infantry as a whole and the problem of the militia line. they could add bonus davange vs scout line to make them counter hussar better, a bonus vs villagers to make them better raiders, they could decrease cost ad time of THS and Champs upgrade. they could make lot of things to make the militia line more appealing, and that would help goths more than any other civ
Worst eco “bonus” in the game. Losing it would make them no weaker. Back in the day it was at least used to hunt boar with smaller numbers of villagers (often without loom), but since the instant loom that aspect of it is useless.
Possibly, although it would also help many other strong infantry civs (already solid counters to Goths) as much. Also, they’ve already made a lot of global changes to militia line, I don’t see them doing anything more than a very minor buff or two.
It never hurts to clarify, but it should be assumed that they don’t. The Portuguese faster techs and Chinese tech discounts don’t affect Age Ups despite them never having to state that explicitly.
