This would be another very good idea.
They are one of the best civilisations in my opinion, even though their rushes are pretty lackluster they make up for it in the late game with strong gunpowder, archers, infantry and cavalry, and they have one of the strongest late-game navies, they are just behind Spanish in the title for the best civ for casual players.
Just become a civ canât rush doesnât make them weak, Spanish, Saracens and Italians can wipe the map clean once they reach the Imperial age. All the mediterranean civs a have strong late-game
1 Like
Pavise was a shield, soldier used for shooting with the xbows and safe reloading, but it was also used for front line melee fights, when the xbowman had to leas the xbow and use a pike or a sword. So it does make sense.
With pavise, condos already have the same PA of champs, but they also have higher speed and HP, and cost less to transition into them. Thatâs why they didnât want to increase the PA. At the start, they had the 1 base PA, and that was nerfed for a reason.
You donât rush a castle for 1MA. Of course if you have extra resources and a castle you would grab it, but what it matters people do the same thing with the nomads UT, and that is a bad UT (the worst probably after the new atheism).
This was nerfed for a reason, I liked their skirms, but in the end, FU skirms are more than enough to deal with archers, especially if your arbs too can have and anti archer role. Have you seen how they hard beat the Ethiopians arbs in that match, and Ethiopians are considered one of the best archers civ in the game. True, in feudal they arenât special, but if they can change the tides that weâll in castle and imp than itâs a balanced UT.
So basically you want to give Italians the same bonus of viets? Because +20%HP and +1/1 armor have the same impact. I mean, I get that they are weak in feudal age, but why change one of the things that are actually useful? Both their 2 UT are probably the best designed part of the civ.
Not really, the effectiveness of armor heavily depends on which units you are fighting. The only thing Iâm not sure about is whether +1/1 from feudal is too strong or not.
Try do the math, +20%HP and +1/1 armor meas exactly:
in feudal age:
- Italians can take 1more hit than viets from another generic archer, which still get +1 than a generic one (36/4=9 and 30/3=10).
- Both takes 8 hits from a skirm (36/5=7.2 and 30/4=7.5) which is 1 more than usual.
- Both takes 8 hits from a scout (the same math as the skirm).
in castle age:
- Both takes 9 hits from another generic xbow (42/5=8.4 and 35/4=8.75) which are 2 more than another generic xbow.
- Both takes 6 hits from an Eskirm (42/7=6 and 35/6=5.83) which is 1 more than usual.
- Both takes 6 hits form a light cav (same as a skirm)
- Viets can (barely) take 2 more hits than italians form a knight, that can still take 1 more hit than a generic xbow (42/10=4.2 and 3.89).
in imp:
- Both takes 8 hits from another generic arb (48/6=8 and 40/5=8) which is one more than other arbs.
- Both takes 4 hits from a cavalier (48/12=4 and 40/11=3.64) which is basically the same for any other generic arbs. Whith paladins itâs almost the same, since italians arbs barely survive the third hit, viets take it a bit better.
- Both takes 7 hits from an Eskirm (48/7=6.86 and 40/6=6.67) which is one more than usual.
- Both takes 7 hits from an hussar (the same as with skirms).
So as you can see, with 2 exceptions (that are barely different) the 2 bonus have the same impact, so givin italians +1/1 from feudal age would mean basically giving them the same bonus of viets.
The differences lies on other aspects:
- The viets bonus is free, start in feudal and affect other ranged units.
- The italians UT affect their 2 UU too, and one isnât a archer, but a different kind of unit, which helps if you need a quick transition into something different.
This 2 aspects makes the 2 bonus balanced. The only real advange is that the viet bonus is more easy to use, because it doesnât require a castle and beacuse you can use it in feudal, but italians compensate their weaker feudal age with a strongher late game.
2 Likes
Again, i donât see why having similar peformance to vietnamese acher-line should be a problem. The current problem of italians is that they are trying to balance two completely different unit types with the same tech, pavise. Archer armor can be easily moved to a civ bonus, thus leaving pavise as an exclusive upgrade to condos. This allows italian (which do not have any infantry bonus) to have viable condos without making them too strong for allied infantry civs (goths, malians, burmese etc.). Itâs also a more elegant solution from a game design perspective imo.
2 Likes
Italians vs turks at 00:16:17
This is the game that some people talked about some days ago (or at least I think that itâs this oneâŠ).
So I think that this game show that GC now are viable, situationally, but viable. Also, I think that it show how italians are actually a good arena civ, maybe only the lack of SE is what keep them behind, then again itâs arena, not arabia, 99.99% of people wonât careâŠ
Still, GC are decent now at least.
1 Like
A bit of overlapping is fine by me, and itâs however invevitable, but this is the exactly same bonus, not a bit of overlapping, is simply the same thing. And thatâs isnât balanced, other than being boring.
Also, pavise is good now because you pick it up for archers (both xbows and GC) and when you do that, at the same time you open the possibility to rapidly switch into condos. The fact that is a common tech is actually a good thing, because it means that youâll always pick it up. If you make it into a âcondo exclusiveâ tech, it becomes just another tech that you need to get when switching into them, because you donât have any reason to get it earlier.
Also I know that month ago some similar suggestion were brought up, but that was before we got most of the changes for the italians, now such buff for their early game woul probably be followed by a nerf into their late game, which again, it makes them just more similar to viets than itâs needed.
Itâs not the same, itâs armor. The fact that they end up performing similarly is another issue.
There are no more original bonii left for archers aside faster movement speed and extra damage. And both of them are likely too strong to be used.
GC is viable but far from decent. It has to be produced in the castle. GC is subpar to arbalests outside vs cavalry. GC acts as a single-purpose unit, which is to counter cavalry, and a substitute for the lack of halbs. Pikes is not as reliable as halbs or GC in imperial age while more viable than GC in castle age.
Relying on castles for counter units is a big disadvantage. I think GC is somewhat like slingers (HC counterpart). But slingers can be produced in archery range. GC is just viable but not a fair tradeoff as the lost of halbs.
1 Like
People maybe donât realize how much italians were changed and buffed though DE, maybe because they never get a big, or unique, or extravagant change, like for example kmer.
So here is a list of all their buff since DE:
- GC reload time reduced from 3 to 2 (now itâs the same as an arb).
- Condos attack buffed form 9 to 10.
- Condos affected by pavise (+1/1 armor).
- GC TT reduced from 22 seconds to 18s, and form 19s to 16s for the EGC.
- Uni techs 33% cheaper.
- GC cost 5 less gold (from 45 to 40).
Maybe not all of those are that sensational, or adressed the real problem at the time, but overall there is a lot of them spread through a year of DE. And oveall, they did their job, italians now are way more viable than they were at the release of DE.
Are they perfect? No, but that doesnât mean that they need now the same buff that they needed a year ago.
Also, all those buffs shows that the devs donât want to buff their early game, because all those buffs have an effect from castle age onward.
Itâs the same, the fact that may seem different on paper because they have different names makes no difference, if the effect is exactly the same through all the ages. Give that to italians, and they would become viets 2.0, with the same feudal age and a strognher late game.
Then why give them a new bonus when it may be enough to make different changes?
Which is its job. Italians have a good tech tree and 2 UU, so even if those are situational, that is fine. GC have to counter cavalry and now they perform that role well. The lack of halb hurts them for another reason, not because GC canât kill cav, but because halbs often acts as a meatshield against most kind of units.
3 Likes
The idea of anticipating part of the tech is just to buff the early game. The only military advantage of the civ is pavise. So it would help the early stages.
Setting +1/1 armor of condos only or +1/0 for archers and condos is not a big issue imo. I like also the @Exradicatorâs proposal.
But having +0/1 as civ bonus and +1/0 as tech helps in going directly into condosâŠ
I think the valuable part of halbs over pikes is not the 5 HP or 2 base atk increase, but the increase in anti-cavalry bonus damage. Pikeman and hussar can still fill the role of meatshield.
The point is GC cannot compensate the lost of halbs at all, unlike other civs that lose halbs. GC is produced in castle and you rely on castle to defend against cavalry in imperial age.
The GC being a ranged unit easily cover the +32 bonus damage of the halbs, since it can land more shots. The probles is that unlike the halbs cannoât be used as a meathshied to shield other units, like siege, because it cost more and itâs less spammable, but at the same time with a range attack the GC can force more engagements.
Yeah ok I get it, you guys want a new feudal bonus at all cost, letâs just agree to disagree then. Also onestly, Iâm pretty certain that such change will never happend, soâŠ
I really do not see how italians can end up being like vietnamese, they may be both archer focused civs, but they play in different ways. Itâs like saying that burmese and aztecs play the same because the have a similar bonus to infantry.
We would be just moving the archer part of the tech to a bonus. This allows to finally have a tech unique to italians to have decent condos without having those units be op for team games. You also solve this way the issue (which was present pre-DE) of having having an excessive powerspike in early imp due condos requiring basically no upgrade and being so fast mass.
Lack of halb is a problem because you become dependent on GCs to counter cavalry. GCs train slowly and are produced only from castles. Also, elite upgrade is stupidly overpriced for what it does.
No, itâs like saying that aztecs should get the effect of their UT earlier because they burmese does. Because itâs what you suggestion for pavise would do, change a balance UT just to have itâs effect earlier.
Thatâs is exactly how things are now for condos. What would chenge is the fact that you wonât have a reason to pick pavise earlier, which is an indirect nerf.
Which is why their TT was shortened, but I agree on the elite upgrade cost.
Then why is it ok for vietnamese to have 20% extra hp from feudal and not have to pay for it? You are using double standards and contradicting yourself.
What? No. You would pick pavise if you want to go condos instead, but not if you stick to archers.
Now I still pick pavise when Iâm going for archers and if then I switch to condos I already have it. If instead I used cav, I have to pick it like it affects just condos, so what is the difference? Because as the tech is now, at least I have a 50% chance that I already have pavise.
The viet bonus is simply strongher, thatâs it. Italians excel at other things, they have better cav and monks and a strongher water presence. I would like to say that they also have better gunpowder but viets have SE.
Just because a civ have a strongher bonus than another civ, itâs not an excuse to give the same bonus to both. The original idea was to give italians +1 PA as a bonus, but without changing pavise. This way at least they would be different, italians archer would be strongher after pavise (which would stay the same since itâs fine) and before that the viet bonus would be better, since it applies to more units and also give melee resistance.
This way, the 2 civs would be different, at least partially, and when this was proposed a lot of people still complained that italians would become viets 2.0⊠immagine if they would get the same effect as you are suggestingâŠ
Itâs not the same bonus and you are you are the only person here saying the italians would become vietnamese 2 here as far as I can see. Giving italians another 1 PA like you proposed is too much, as they become too tanky and would not fix the issues regarding having the condos balanced for both italians and possible allies. Pavise is just doing too many thing at once right now.
Pavise would be cheaper. If you are going archers you can still pick it if it gives just +1MA, or you can skip it if it provides +1/1 to condos only.
If you are going condos, you would spend less resources than now in any case.
Overall both my proposal and @Exradicatorâs one would slightly help condos
It depends on how you read it. Currently pavise and the Vietnamese bonuses are very close for archers, but pavise affects the UUs while Vietnamese bonus affects other archery range units, most notably skyrms.
But our proposals are not changing the final output: everything would remain the same in the late game.
We are simply saying that anticipating a thing that already holds (i.e., Italian archers similar to Vietnamese), helps a lot Italians in the early game that otherwise would be terrible
1 Like