What is wrong with this? I think @DoctBaghi is right here. Even if the GC would become a late game pop efficient less-gold intensive arbs replacement it is fine. This happens almost for every archer civ (Chinese, Britons, Mayans, Vietnamese…)…
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But it’s not much about weaknesses, it’s about versatility. GC are strong vs cumans because cumans lack bracer.
Being out-ranged it’s a big thing, also consider that most of the times cav simply run away from your GC to simply return in numbers when they suit them the best, so in reality you aren’t really countering cavalry.
The big problem is that standard xbows are preferred over GC even against cav, because even if they have less bonus damage, they compensate that with numbers and flexibility.
GC aren’t bad, but as they are they are too situational, and even in those situations their advantage over standard xbow isn’t that big.
More range means more shots vs all targets, so more damage output overall.
I mean, you’ll still need castles instead of ranges, and you would spend 20w more…
A buff on their speed, even just 0.02/0.04 more, may be enough.
More for britons. Plumes and rattan are good to rush even in mid castle age, and CKN too are usually rushed.
GC should be prioritized when facing a cav civ, and all other times ignored and the standard xbow preffered, since you don’t need castles (maybe just one for pavise).
Still, the direction that they took with this upgrade is good, having 5g less may not be a big deal, but it’ll have its positive impact.
the idea is clear: they nerfed italians and franks so people would buy sicilians and burgundians.
What, I don’t see the Italians changes as a nerf, maybe a small nerf for water in imp, but it’s a buff for pure land maps.
And the franks nerf was called for a long time by the community.
But I agree that burgundians and sicilians are broken OP.
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Um do you know what you’re talking about? Italians got buffed on land multiple ways and the franks nerf is both minor and necessary. Franks have been one of the absolute best civs in the game for at least 6 months.
Issue with making them more versatile and giving them 1 more range is how do you counter them? Their current common counters are Eskirms, Arbalests and siege/onagers. Italians get hussars, cheaper bombard cannons and FU monks to deal with all these units. You also have to consider civs like Franks, Persians, Slavs and Teuton who lack bracer and will struggle to counter with skirms if genbows outrange them
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Well, siege rams and onagers still would work fine, and skirms will still be cost effective (except franks, but onestly if franks would have a civ that counter them really hard out of 37 it would be fine by me…). Yeah you can add BBC and hussars, but so the enemy can add BBC of their own (maybe with SE) or throwing halbs at your hussars while their SO kill your GC.
I mean, it would be a strong combo, but not without counters.
It is true that it would be harder to counter them, but it would still be super hard to mass them, and the +1 range would come only after the elite upgrade.
I’m not saying that giving them more range is mandatory, but as they are now I don’t really see many reasons to prefer GC over xbows. Mass xbows are often used well enough vs mass cav.
They can further reduce the cost (just gold or both wood and gold) to give us a reason to train them, or increase the base speed, or the base atk for the elite (castle age GC already have more base atk than xbow) but as they are, they are super situational…
I mean, let’s look at the all foot archers UU, and you see that almost all castle foot archers UU counter a weakness of the standard archers:
Longbows → out range onagers
ChuKos → destroy rams
Rattan → have high PA, so resist vs skirms
GC → kill cavalry
I also might add, that cavalry is arguably the less effective counter of the 4 against archers, but probably the easier to use. But this is just a personal consideration…
Now I think that the GC is a completely different unit from when it was released (faster RoF in castle age, less TT, less gold cost…) and now it’s at least usable in some match ups. But still, it’s not a unit that you can rely on as Italians…
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You could add:
Plume archers →outrun towers and skirms fire
Plumes are its own case, since it’s the middle ground between xbows and CA, but I guess that they cover the generic downside of archers’ low speed.
Still, it doesn’t really counter directly any standard archer’s counter, unless you consider that it’s easier to micro down manganels, or to escape skirms and to to some degree even cav.
Still, has anyone tried out the new Italians? How they feel?
I’m still bogged down with work and university so I don’t have time to online, that’s why I would like to hear your opinion…
i’m currently working 16 on, 8 off 7 days a week, i told my job if stuff doesn’t change in 2 weeks i’m gone.
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i feel like a discount on the university (the building itself) would be nice. It would encourage people to use it in low elo too. So -75 or - 100 wood for university could bring a nice little help for early ballistic.
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I understand you, I work a lot less hours (though I’m not payed because law is a s****) but every free time I got are swallowed by my thesis.
I’m able just to play some games at week, I play AoM/aoe3 since that’s the game that my friends and girlfriend play (not that I dislike AoM or aoe3, but I would like some aoe2 too…).
Yeah it could work, but I would prefer buffing the age up discount, since it would make them more flexible.
Still, it’s true that now in water maps to make full use of your bonus you need to invest 200w in castle age. You would have do it otherwise, but now you should prioritize it, and having cheaper university building can address that.
True, but I actually see them as a cheaper and fast version of rattan archers in this regard. Both have more speed and pierce armor than a standard archer. Both can outrun skirms and mangonels, but rattan archers feel more tanky, and plumes feel speedy. Plumes are easier to mass, though, and when looking at archers army we can see that Mayans crossbows are also cheaper and less tanky than Vietnamese ones. Thus, the archer UU of those civs are like an evolved version of the standard archer for the civ, like the longbow archer and brits crossbows case.
GC are not exactly an evolved version of Italian crossbow, because italians archers have only more pierce armor (after pavise, which also affects GC).
With this big water nerf it is possible to buff the age up discount.
Still it would be more balanced a dark/feudal help to get to castle age, where they can exploit the university bonus.
The feudal age is really too weak
Yes yes, but my point was that rattans are less vulnerable only to skirms, while plumes are in general a bit less vulnerable vs all archers counters (except rams).
Still, the argument stay the same…
Well, that’s the point, they are an evolved xbow because more MA and HP do help, along with bonus vs cav.
The problem is, that MA and HP aren’t important stats for archers, while the ability to easily mass them is way more important, followed by the range and attack.
Onestly, it’s not a big water nerf. In castle age the only downside is that you need a university a bit earloer to fully use your bonus. In imp it hurts to see shipwright that less discounted, but it’s too many resources less saved (about 400).
As they are they can use the cheaper upgrades to get the university and ballistics sooner, so it’s not that bad. If you buff the age up or give a discount on the university building it will be more than enough.
It’s enaugh what they have in feudal age, not all civs need a strong feudal age bonus, and Italians have more food when the hit feudal and need less to click to castle age, so in total it’s 195 food spread in feudal, and 30g, which helps towards a fast ballistics.
If you buff the age up to 20%, it becomes 260f spread during feudal, and 40g. If you let them save some wood on the uni, you get the same result, just with wood.
Italian rekt Sicilian on water anytime of the day. The devs had to nerf Franks because if they didn’t do so the community would be besieging FE right now lmao.