Yeah, but one could also reverse that and say: what does it matter to have an extra 1 if the enemy can easily (of course it takes skill to micro BBCs) snipe all of them with extra range?
1 Like
Itās unlikely to have that much BBC at the same time in the same spot for both sides. And still, the BBC with SE can micro and retreat with 1 or 2 BBC and there is little that you can do.
Well, of course you can have better micro, but we are assuming that the skill level is equalā¦
this might be cool, but i would tone it down, otherwise it becomes a market for the late game maybe? like researching squires 100f = 50g.
i would reduce it to something like 30g, and maybe even limit it to eco techs only, but i still like the idea. its very different and somehow seems to fit them
extra numbers or extra range. as opposed to extra numbers and extra range.
1 Like
Extra range and reduced cost on a gunpowder civ sounds perfectly fine to me. They would be just doing what they are supposed to.
okay, so why donāt Turks get siege engineers? and by the way Italians are actually called an Archer and Naval civ, not a Gunpowder civ.
1 Like
Because turks get a UT which gives them more range than SE gives, and also have other 3 bonuses affecting BBC.
Italians have just one bonus (thatās why they arenāt a gunpowder civ and turks are) and they would have a āstandard techā which most of the civs that rely on BBC needs.
2 Likes
haha just watched thisā¦ still crazy how much these guys micro, but heart himself says he should have died, and that italians are good when allowed to get into that positionā¦ itās like saying cuman 2 tc is OP, but you let them free boom itās your own fault
it also makes me feel better seeing pros getting housed so often, or forgetting thigns like thumb ring 
āwhy are my crossbows missing so muchā
2 Likes
I would give them SE instead of Artillery. You are crazy if you spend 450 Stones for. Also SOTL says it is one of the worse tech not because it is bad, it is rarely used because of the stupid cost.
1 Like
I think that Turks without SE makes sense. It is somehow like franks which have a better bloodlines for their Knights.
+2 range is arguably better than +1 and a bonus damage. Turks also have SR.
Maybe we should think of Portuguese that have BBCs at the same gold cost of Italians, with a UT and SE.
Regarding Italians specifically, their siege sucks badly in terms of power. But there are other reasons why they could get SE:
- it is very meaningful thematically, considering that the university civ should have the only important university tech you can actually miss
- a SE BBC would partially justify such a bad early game. You try to survive to have a solid rewad in the later stages
In my opinion, Italians could get SE, but the civ has clearly a huge problem in the early stages. So, regardless SE (that imo they should get), the civ still misses either a military or an eco bonus that helps in feudal ageā¦
1 Like
The cost is absurd yes, but thatās not the point. The concept of giving them artillery instead of SE makes sense and is balanced.
No it is not balanced because it is not used! I would rather build another castle to protect to have more map control than the extra range and then mostly only for BC. SE is for ALL siege.
Even people are calling for early buff for Koreans which has a great late game. I would prefer early game buff rather than SE if Italians really need a buff.
In my opinion the two things are disjoined. Italians do desperately need an early game buff either military or economic.
SE is thematically very meaningful and would not make them OP, especially considering how bad their siege is, which sounds pretty meaningless for a civ which should have a good late game.
3 Likes
One possible early and minor bonus:
Militia (or all infantry) has +2 LOS.
As today, no civ receives a LOS buff for their infantry. I think the reason for this is that most LOS bonus are team bonuses and giving extra LOS to good drushers would be broken.
But i feel that it would be a decent bonus for a civ without significant military and eco bonuses in the early game, like italians, spanish or byzantines (i exlude portoguese and vietnamese because they could make easy drushes with this bonus, although i am open for them to receive it). Italians are aknownledged as a jack of all trades civ, and despite so they have no bonus for their infantry.
With extra LOS, their drush or m@a rush would be a bit less punishable and a bit more efficient but their lategame shouldnt be affected (LOS bonuses in late game are less important after you have deployed 100 militar units and buildings across the map)
If the bonus affected all infantry besides militia line, their condos would be a bit better raiders. But i dont think their halbs would perform a lot of better.
1 Like
Well, this bonus is a bit negligible imo. When I think of a military bonus, I think of something like extra speed or attack. For instance:
- archers and skyrms +1PA
- skyrms +1 attack
- archers shoot one extra arrow (the same of mayan skyrms)
- skyrms attack 15% faster
- all units attack 10% faster
I provide negligible bonuses because i think they may need only a little push (like buffing their age discount 5% more.
Winrates are not updated in aoestats.io, but even so italians are not within the bottom 5 civs. So I think the university buff are already helping them a lot. If this is true, the bonus you suggest are not bad, but may be a bit too strong.
2 Likes
But set aside the cost for a moment, the concept, of lacking SE but having a UT that give a better effect on just the BBC is correct. Since with that +2 they can snipe any other BBC, and with the extra HP they are difficult to out-micro too.
Then I agree that the stone cost is absurd, and it should be replaced with a wood cost, but overall it makes sense.
Tbh a 5% buff to the age up discount would be very minor and I would make sense mainly if paired with SE.
The bonus I wrote are stronger alternative to the 5% extra discount (the civ would remain weak even with the 5% discount)
I agree, before giving them new bonuses, we should tweak a bit what they already have. For example some suggestions are:
- giving them SE
- buffing the age up discount to 20%
- giving heavy demo upgrade (if the nerf on water itāll result too big)
- giving to condos +1 attack bonus against eagles (more of a fix, something that was simply forgotten)
I think that they should add one or more of this suggestions, until they added them all. And then if they are still weak, we can talk of new bonuses.