Making A New Aoe3 Meta

To be clear, these are not balance changes. Instead, the suggestions that follow are intended to shake up and create a new meta and make some civs/units feel better to use. they are incomplete and focused more on which direction to explore taking the game in the future.

they built upon but separate from the general changes I posted here Improving AOE3 - Age of Empires III: DE / III - Discussion - Age of Empires Forum

                       Age-ups And Politicians

Revamped euro politicians to add more viable choices. revamp of unique church cards as well. for example, maybe Spanish logistician now additionally sends 1 dog per exploration age shipment and improves dog stats by 10%. Or maybe quartermaster now sends a market wagon and removes wood costs from market upgrades, or perhaps governor giving 2 outposts and frontier outpost upgrade. Water politicians now require a water map to be available, new age 2 Mediterranean/northern European politician that gives fishing boats and dock wagon/first fishing upgrade. Logisticians in general no longer cost more resources.

fortress upgrade now costs 800 more food, 2000 food 1000 gold. Exiled prince now takes an additional 20 seconds, other fortress age ups an additional 10. Industrial is now 400 more food and gold, 2400 food and 1600 gold. Imperial age now 5000 food 5000 gold. Revolting now costs 5k food and adds 1 shipment.

                                Cards in General

Crates and building/military unit cards are now roughly 400, 800, 1200, 2400 resources. Politician age up rewards now generally provide the same number of resources as well. Creates more compelling choices between +20% musket damage vs 24 muskets, or 2.4k wood vs a factory. Merc and special units are now stronger.

No more duplicate unit cards that are the exact same - + a unit, aka 4/5 cossack, or 1 / 2 infinite rockets. Resource crates also no longer have duplicates, instead following 400/800/1200/2400 resources. team and infinite cards now have a 25% penalty to resource value given. Rainbow crates instead give an additional 25% bonus. Jap double crates no longer have a penalty.

reducing the amount of hp and damage bonuses provided by cards to a maximum of 30% for either total per unit type. that means one 10% either hp or damage card in fortress, and one 20% either hp or damage card in industrial with an additional unique civ effect, such as increased range (Genitours). other sources of damage and hp, such as gun trade big button or golden pavilion are toned down or changed. this should let the counter system be more functional in team/late/treaty games without stacking absurd amounts of bonuses on top of each other.

Eco theory now an age 4 universal 25% gather and yield upgrade.

Explorers and heroes gain less damage and hitpoints per age up, instead now have more upgrades available at church equivalent per age.

                                 Buildings

all buildings now have a 2x universal bonus vs cavalry, and a 1.5 rof. they instantly track targets and have no attack delay. malus vs assault ships, artillery and siege units increased. Buildings no longer have malus vs villagers. Buildings can now shoot other buildings.

tc damage reduced to 5 damage per villager. tc now only has 5k base hp, but auto upgrades damage and hp like units. Safe zone around tc removed/reduced in supremacy. no longer has bonus vs villagers.

improved building card now only increases building hp by 20%, but additionally also increases building damage by 20% as well as increasing all units building speed by 50%. stonemasons removed from the game.

advanced building cards now only increase building hp and damage by 20% as well as their other benefits. advanced wonders card removed from the game, wonders instead auto upgrade hp except for agra fort which follows its own upgrade path. Porcelain tower resource trickle auto upgrades.

Siege workshop, foundry, arsenal, outpost now 200 wood. Livestock pen, church, monastery just 100 wood.

Outpost/fort los greatly increased. Outposts and warhuts now have a base 14 build limit to account for larger map, and cost reduced to 200 wood. In treaty there is now a tech at the church/monastary/plaza to further increase building limits, extensive fortifications card removed. Their damage is doubled to 60, but their hp halved to 1000. Both fortress and industrial upgrades now improve hp and damage by 50% with an additional 100% imperial upgrade. Castles follow a similar change, are cheaper and have aoe right away. Forts now have 250 base damage and 10k hp, from 150 damage and 8.5k hp and +1 aoe.

                              General Unit Changes

minutemen and warriors cost 200 food. Asian emergency units instead cost 100 food each. they auto upgrade. Their card spawns now only cost food as well.

all military land units except mercenaries now have an age 2 baseline, including artillery and special military units. They all have a minimum of 4 speed.

Unique church shipments now have 3 levels, 750 food for 1k value of units at age 2, 1500 food for 2k value of units age 3, and 3k food for 4k value of units age 4. Means 5 bakshir ponies, into 10 bakshir ponies, into 20 bakshir ponies. Once the first is sent they replace base counterparts in cards, meaning Cossack cards now give a smaller amount of bakshir ponies. Merc units from church now a onetime age 4 shipment that increases stats by 10% and enables their training at a discount for food(still gold if dutch). Merc imperial upgrade now gives less stats.

all cavalry now deal significantly less damage to buildings i.e. hussars and cuirs only have 10 siege damage from 20/30. however artillery, heavy infantry and especially melee infantry siege damage is now also boosted i.e. pikeman 32 siege increased to 50 siege, musks from 20 to 25, and falconets from 2x bonus to 3x bonus.

Elephant now have base 7 speed, heavy cav speed increased to 7.5, light cav speed increased to 7.5 as well. Camels instead 8. Emphasis on mobility over siege damage.

dedicated ranged units such as light infantry and light cavalry no longer have any bonus damage with their melee attack, unless stated (bolas warriors with card upgrade).

Dedicated melee units now have minimum 5 move speed, some like pikeman bumped to 5.5. their base melee attack is now a minimum of 10.

siege units in general now have a .5 malus vs heavy cavalry, to make clear what their counter is. Asian cav now only have a bonus vs light infantry, rather than bonus vs all infantry and malus vs heavy infantry. light infantry no longer has a malus vs all cavalry and a bonus vs light cavalry, instead a separate malus vs heavy cavalry and a bonus vs light cavalry.

most non siege/artillery units have their resistance set to 20%

most light cavalry now only have 20% melee resistance, malus vs vills now x0.25.

artillery have their resistance increased to 80%, now have age 2 base stats. Now either have 3 or 6 rof.

siege units generally have 50% ranged resistance, overriding base 20%.

most siege units have a .5x malus vs heavy cavalry.

grenadiers have base 25 damage 4x vs buildings, 0.5x vs heavy cavalry damage, 120 hp, 50% ranged resistance, no setup delay, 16 range. veteran grenadiers automatically get the benefit of the hand mortar card, civs that can train grenadiers by default no longer have access to that card, veteran upgrade now grants +4 range. cost increased to 160 food 40 gold. No longer have heavy infantry tag.

skirmisher base range resistance reduced to 20%. now all light infantry have a x0.5 malus vs heavy cavalry rather than x0.75, and a x1.5 bonus vs light cavalry. cost changed to 60 food 60 gold.

dragoons now have 20% melee resistance, and cost increased to 100 food 100 gold. damage increased from 22 to 25.

musketeers now have 25 ranged attack from 23, their melee attack reduced to 12 from 13. cost changed to 80 food 20 gold.

pikeman and crossbowman now cost pure food. Pikes now deal 10 melee damage, 5.5 move speed.

Halberds now base 5 move speed, lower base attack, higher multiplier. Big siege damage.

all units now take up a maximum of 5 population space. heavy cannons, bombards and elephants included.

horse guns are now exactly like falconets, except they cost 100 more gold and move faster. napoleon guns are basically falconets without having to set up and faster move speed, and +50% age 3 stats. artillery have age 2 base stats like all non-mercenary units. All have increased damage vs buildings and 3/6 rof.

bad mercs such as jat lancers, arsonists, stradiots, corsairs buffed. Corsairs are not worth the same price as jaegers and highlanders. Zouves now merc version of nizam and can build military buildings. All mercenaries now have 50% resistance, unless they are artillery which have 80% resistance. Mercs now regenerate out of combat. Elmite and jat lancers gain a lance charge attack, stradiots gain a charged javelin ability that can be used while moving. Arsonists replaced with a merc version of hand mortar grenadiers (are Indians actually ok with having a mercenary call arsonists?)

New Korean rocket artillery/turtle ship mercenary. New Sudanese riflemen/Mali heavy cav mercenary. New sturdy South American stealth melee infantry mercenary. An occasional custom 1 build limit pirate warship mercenary in water maps(maybe an dreadnought?).

Spies gain a ranged pistol attack. Ninjas gain a ranged shuriken attack. Stats rebalanced.

advanced scouts now have a build limit of 10, cost a large amount of food, gain rifles and have the same stat line as forest prowlers +20% hp and damage, and auto upgrade. All native tradeposts now allow you to train a native scout for food. Unique Asian scouts added to Asian native tps. Envoys can be recruited from explorer now.

Pets move faster and now have ranged resistance and a bonus vs light infantry, functioning as pseudo cavalry. Pets sent form home city can now be trained by explorer. Pet stats and stat gains more balanced between damage and hp.

Petards cost 150 food, can no longer melee attack, 50% ranged resist, age 2 stats are 150 hp 1500 siege damage.

villagers now have 20% ranged resistance by default including couriers, can change to melee stance and auto attack, and no longer freeze or stutter when retasked as a group. They start with 10 ranged attack, couriers increased to 15. All villagers also have 30 base siege damage, which auto upgrades as you age up past commerce age. Multipliers vs hunts adjusted; bonus vs artillery increased to x5 from x2. New melee stance animations. Pioneers and warrior culture now improve both hp and damage and give new models. Pathfinding and responsiveness improved, especially when in a group.

special units are stronger, cost less pop, and give more xp on death.

                                Russia

Russians now start with 7 vills 300 food 200 wood and 100 gold, rather than 5 vills 600 food 200 wood. more vills gathering early, and less time spent on crates is a win. Batch train speed discount is now only 10% for all units.

strelets now cost gold instead of wood, 300 food 150 gold for batch of 10(40/20 base) and 18(20) second train speed. their base hp is reduced to 60 from 90, their base damage increased to 15 from 10. ranged resistance reduced to 20% instead of 30%, move speed is now only 4.0 instead of 4.5.

strelets are now a RG unit.

oprichniks now cost 40 food 180 gold. base hp reduced to 200 from 250 and siege attack reduced to 40 from 64. they now have 50% ranged resistance rather than 20% and base attack increased to 50 from 20. they now also have a 0.5x malus vs heavy cavalry.

Cossack 20% ranged resistance from 30%. Hp increased to 250 from 225, damage reduced to 25 from 26. Cost changed to 100 food 60 gold from 75/75. Siege is now 5.
Cavalry archers now have reduced hp, higher attack, higher move speed, 20% resist.

halberds now spawn in blocks of 5 rather than 3.

New soviet age up option, which costs more than imperial and does a drastic change to civ including architecture and flags. replaces units with pre ww1 army. Allows potential for more factory slots. If ai does it, new ai personality.

Cards:
Team cavalry scouts replaced with Team Siberian Pathfinders ships a mounted high LOS hero with high multipliers vs treasure guardians and increased resources from treasures.

Age 3 cards: Ranged Infantry Damage, Light Cavalry Damage. 10% each.

Age 4 cards:

Boyars: Cossack and cavalry archers Damage increased 20%, now deal slightly higher bonus damage to their intended targets.

Imperial Retainers: strelets now cost pure food and increased bonus vs heavy infantry and light cavalry; damage increased by 20%.

Tsar Cannon: 2.4k food, ships 4 heavy cannon and gives them 20% increased damage, +1 bonus vs infantry and buildings.

                                   Germans

no longer have a shipment malus, but bonus is now one uhlan per shipment. uhlan now have 240 hp, 40 attack. cost increased to 160 gold 40 food.

now starts with 7 villagers instead of 3 settler wagons, and only 80 villager train limit. settler wagons can be trained for 200 food from the tc and mill right away at double the train time of villagers. settler wagons now only take 1 pop, have base 5.0 move speed and guild artisans is now an age 2 upgrade at the market that increases their yield and gather rate from natural resources by a large amount.

Maybe explore a modifiable civ depending on age up choices, such as Germanic states such as Prussia and Austria. Maybe if you choose prussia get dragoons and rg Prussian musketeers, which replace dopplesoldners/warwagons and their cards. Or perhaps a unique age up option besides imperial and revolts?

War wagons now cost 200 gold 100 food instead of 150/150. base damage 25, rof now 1.5, hp reduced to 400 from 500.

Zwiehanders no longer a unique church tech, dopplesoldners now a rg unit. New unique church tech added. Dopple hp increased to 320.

Cards: Germantown farmers removed, guild artisan is now a market tech. no malus, only one uhlan.
Age 2 five dopple card for 200 food

Age 3 cards: Ranged infantry damage, heavy cavalry damage 10% each
Have access to multi falconet cards.

Age 4 cards:

Windbüchse: Skirmishers 20% damage, additional 20% at close range and can now stealth.

Lipizzaner Cavalry: uhlan damage increased by 20%, +1 speed and refund some gold on death.

German Mercenary Contracts: mercenary Damage Increased by 20%, Mercenaries can now be trained from military buildings. Unique church contracts now also reduce merc train costs as well.

For 2.4k food get 24 polish hussars, which now have wings, lances with charge attack and auto upgrade.

                                    British

Villagers spawned are now shipped and grant xp.

Virginia company now increases manor cost to 200 wood, increases build bounty, and spawns an extra villager on completion. manors now also have +8 line of sight and a +1 move speed aura for civilian units

Logistician now adds longbowmen and does not replace villager spawn. These longbowmen are shipped and grant xp.

Rockets have age 2 base stats.

longbowman cost changed to 100 food 20 gold. hp reduced to 72, ranged resistance reduced to 20%, ranged damage increased to 18. no longer have a setup animation. now gain Yeomen benefits veteran/industrial upgrades.

Gain a third factory slot by default, and a third factory card as well. Factories can now choose to build heavy cannon instead of rockets. Rocket range increased, rof is now 3, but have a larger malus vs cav and artillery.

age 3 cards: ranged infantry hit points, Heavy cavalry damage, light cavalry hit points. 10% each
estates now ships 1 villager per manor after a delay. Yeomen removed.

age 4 cards:

musketeer/grenadier hit points: 20% increased hit points, slight bonus damage at range for their intended targets.

The Kings Own: hussar Damage 20%, now cost pure food, can be built from barracks.

                                  Ottomans

villager train speed is now 45 seconds. can stop auto spawn by right clicking the villager icon.

Do not have train speed upgrades at the church nor train speed cards. instead, each villager train speed upgrade now also reduces land unit train speed by 20% each. first upgrade reduces all land unit train speed by 20% and sends 3 villagers for 400 food. second upgrade is another 20% and 6 vills for 8k food in fortress age. third and final upgrade is the same 20% and 12 villagers for 1.6k food. after the third upgrades villagers will spawn in 30 seconds, like how fast villagers spawn currently after upgrades in de.

now always spawns with a mosque wagon but 100 less wood, 100 extra food and one extra villager.

janissary cost increased to 140 food 20 gold. hp is now 250, attack is now 25, melee attack increased to 18*2.5 vs cavalry, siege increased to 30.

Janissary are now a RG unit.

Abus guns now cost 160 gold 40 food, 120 hp, 50% ranged resistance, 50 siege damage, 1.5x multiplier vs light cavalry and heavy infantry, 0.5x malus vs Heavy cavalry, standard 3.0 rof. 16 range increased by 4 for veteran upgrade.

spahi hp now 800, attack 40 as age 2 base stats, 2 pop cost, auto upgrade, increased bounty.

Great Bombard have age 2 stats, damage increased by 20%, rof reduced to 6.
New mameluke unique church shipment. Merc contractor instead adds stradiot. Nizam no longer improve heavy infantry or train times and come in 3 stages from commerce to industrial.
New deli horseman ranged cav, uhlan version of the dragoon.
Age 1/2 Cards:

silk road moved to Unique church tech and is now 50% in age 3.
5 abus/grenadiers for 200 food.

age 3 cards:

300 food artillery detachment of 3 falconets. Janissary Hit points 10%, Heavy Cavalry hit points 10%, Hungarian Engineers: abus guns, grenadiers, falconet, and Bombards damage 10%. Falconets cost no wood.

Age 4 Cards:

Acemi Olglan: Janissary hit points 20%, melee and siege attack increased 50%, cost reduced by 25%.

Ottoman Siegeworks: abus guns, grenadiers, falconet, and Bombards damage 20%, range increased by 4, +1.0x bonus vs buildings.

Infinite 2 bombards card, 4 bombards card.

Ottoman Heavy Cavalry: spahi, hussar hp 20%, move speed +1.0, constantly regenerate 2.5% max hp a second.

                                       French

cuirs 200 food 100 gold, their siege damage reduced to 10 and no longer aoe, train time decreased, base hit points increased.

Code napoleon building cost penalty removed, increased gathering bonus to 20%. now increases courier cost and train times by 100%.

New unique church shipment that ships several horse artilleries/napoleon guns in age 4 after finishing grenadier shipments.

An additional unique church shipment added.

Vauban fortress now sends a unique star fort with new larger model and much higher stats, can be rebuilt at the capitol.

Courier ranged resist reduced to 20% but ranged and melee attack increased to 15. Now their bonus requires higher macro and active engagement to make use of.

age 3 cards:

Heavy Cavalry Hit points 10%, Ranged Infantry Hit points 10%.

age 4 cards:

Thoroughbreds: hp 20%, +1 aoe.

Wilderness Warfare: 20% hit points for des bios, native warriors, and skirmishers. +1.0 speed.

Gribeauval System: 20% damage for falconets and heavy cannon, +1.0 speed.

                                       Dutch

Vills now cost 80 gold; only gold gather bonus is first market upgrade.

tulip speculation is now an upgrade rather than a card at the bank.

Ruyter’s 20% melee resistance, 18 ranged damage, 100 hp, 40 food 80 gold.

Now has a 5 skirm card age 2 and 10 blue guard musketeers for 750 gold if church card sent.

age 3 cards:

10% Light Cavalry damage, 10% Hand infantry Damage.

Age 4 cards:

2 in 1 Dutch special: 20% damage for Ruyter’s and halberdiers. food cost is now 50% smaller gold cost. Coffee trade -.5 move speed for military units.

Military Reforms: Dutch military units move 0.5 faster and +25% build bounties.

                                 Spanish

rodelero 150 hp, 20% melee resistance, 80 food 20 gold, 12 damage.
Cards:

now have commerce age hussar and xbow cards, also have access to jaeger card age 3.

age 3 cards: Archaic Infantry Hit points, Hand Cavalry Hit points 10% each.

age 4 cards:

Archaic infantry hit points: 20% hp, train times and cost 25% lower.

Caballeros: lancers 20% hp, 1x bonus vs infantry.

                                  Ports

cassador: 72 hp, 20% ranged resistance, 25 attack, 4.0 move speed, 80 food 40 gold

Organ gun: 5 pop 400 gold 100 wood, same hp as falconets, increased base damage after upgrading from age 2 base stats, 0.4x vs cavalry and artillery, 3 aoe, all shots fired at the same time just like how the unit is described in its history section.

cards:

age 1 Tordesillas expansion. ships 1 outpost wagon, each age up now also ships a military wagon.

age 3: Ranged Infantry Damage, Light Cavalry Damage, Artillery hit points 10%.
Access to culverin cards.

age 4:

Genitours: dragoons 20% damage, 4 range.

Gunpowder Infantry Attack: Gunpowder infantry 20% damage, 2 range.

for the rest of the civs damage/hp cards need to be taken a closer look in hand with auras, big buttons, and other factors. so just lightly touching on things. without looking into cards too much. most stat upgrades given from big buttons replaced with a new effect.

                                      Aztecs

coyote runners are now heavy cavalry, 200 hp, 20% ranged resistance, 18*1.5x light infantry, 80 food 40 gold.

Eagle Runner Knights now light cavalry. 20% ranged resistance, 100 gold 60 food.

Arrow Knights: now have a base 5 siege damage * 10 vs artillery and buildings, 1.5 rof. no setup helps. 100 food 40 gold

Jaguar Knight: 250 hp, 25 attack, 20% melee resistance, 5.5 move speed, 140 food 20 gold.

puma spears: 60 food 20 gold, 20% melee resistance, 5.5 move speed, +1 bonus vs cavalry, hp reduced to 120.

slinger: 60 food 20 gold, 10 attack, 20% ranged resistance.
Skull knights 5 move speed, 1 pop cost, increased bounty, better stats.

                                    Lakota

Starts with extra villagers and wood.

War chief no longer snares. Explorer card no longer adds siege aura. Instead gives vill bonus damage aura.

Dog soldier base age 2 stats 800 hp, 40 damage, 2 pop cost, increased bounty, gain extra bonus vs infantry with age ups instead of card. Tc big button now has 3 levels, all food costs, no longer tied to game time, increasing amount of dog soldiers per lvl.

Bow rider and rifle riders move faster, bow riders now have penalty vs vills like other light cav. Both deal very little siege damage. wakina, bow rider and rifle rider resist reduced to 20%.

Rifle riders now have 4 more attack, 15 from 11, and 25 less hp from 205 to 180. Cost is now 160 food 60 gold.

Warclubs and cetans now cost pure food. Warclubs now have 5.5 move speed.

                                    Haud

4 pop light cannon, 1 pop ram, 2 pop mantlet is default with pop card removed. Mantlet now has 50% penalty vs heavy cavalry, ram now costs pure food and is available to build age 2 with siege workshop.
All have age 2 base stats.

Kayne horseman now 100 food 80 gold, higher hp lower damage, bonus vs light infantry.

Tomahawk now 80 food 20 gold.

                                     China

old han units now have 20% base stats increased; old han card removed. wood cost banner armies now have a greater food cost instead, banner armies now more much more food heavy in general. 1 more heavy cavalry included in heavy cavalry banner armies/cards. repelling volley card removed with inclusion of arsenal, chuk gain volley benefits on upgrade. Banner army base train time reduced.

chuk/arque/keshik resist reduced to 20%, keshiks now melee resist instead.

Flying crow gain bonus vs infantry and buildings as they age up. Only take 3 pop cost. Hand mortars more range and bonuses, pop cost increased to 2, now cost pure food.

Flame thrower is now an artillery unit that sets up with limber animation, cost 300 gold 200 food 5 pop, 20 range with passthrough damage. stats, sounds, and animations updated, has smoother attack and longer arcing spouts of spectacular fire. New fiery death animations added for itself and other units.

Disciple limit is now 1 per age, increased to 2 per age with pagoda wonder. disciples now cost 200 food, gain an increase to their stats. Non-human units cannot be converted into disciples, instead give bonus xp and export.

Can rebuild factory wagon at capitol equivalent if a factory slot is unlocked at consulate.

                                   Japan

heavenly kami card removed. 10 shrines max, costs/pop doubled, hp the same. now rate is the same for all animals and have 8 slots instead of 4. elephants take up 4 slots for 4 times the generation. in age 4 can train shrine deer at shrines for 200 food each, consulate livestock pen removed. shrine rate adjusted; shrine wonder now requires 16 animals for full benefit. vill limit reduced to 60 from 75.
Shrines now have a set of 4 upgrades that increase generation by 25% each age, up to industrial. Shrine resource generation now increase animal generation as well, rather than just shrine base.

ashigaru now have 30 attack 150 hp, 4 move speed, and cost 80 food 40 gold.

Yumi have 20% ranged resistance, 20 attack, 100 food 20 gold.

naginata and samurai resist reduced to 20%, yabusame now has siege unit tag with increased siege damage. Samurai attack increased to 40, hp to 240.

Daimyo and shogun no longer take pop space. Commerce age and fortress age daimyo now unlocked by default at the town center for 400g + 60 second train time, shogun unlocked in industrial age 800 gold + 60 seconds. Their cards now additionally add in age-appropriate number of naginata riders (2, 4, 8).

Golden pavilion buffs changed. Now ranged buff increase is +10% total ranged damage, +.5 move speed for ranged units. Melee buff is now +10% total damage and hitpoints, +1 movespeed. New Daimyo/shogun buff massively increases damage and hp, and increases movespeed and train speed. New water buff slightly increases damage, hitpoints, movespeed and range. Now have unique names, like kamikaze for water buff.

Consulate imperial upgrade now costs 3k export and ships a special wonder wagon with an exclusive ability, disables and replaces samurai, yabusame, naginata, ashigaru, flaming arrows and yuumi and brings about new modern military units to reflect pre-ww1 japanese army. New navy, New theme music plays, new architecture, new deck and new flag, Isolation consulate replaced. shrines now only produce unique resource called Imperial loyalty that can be spent in special wonder, will instead have increased villager eco bonuses and instant factory slots with potential for more. Daimyo, sohei, dojos and shogun receive new models and name as well. If the ai does it new ai personality takes over.

                                   India

Vills now cost 50 wood. houses 100 wood, 1200 hp. only wood gathering bonus is first market upgrade.

elephants now all cost 5 pop, elephant pop cost card removed. Wood cost replaced with gold, total cost is now food heavy. base stats adjusted.

Now always have access to an artillery mercenary option like Native Americans. If napoleon guns are not reworked, they are not included as an option.

sepoy: 100 food 20 gold, 180 hp, 25 attack, 30 siege.
Gurkha: 80 food 40 gold, 110 hp, 16 attack, 20% ranged resistance. 16 range increased to 20 with veterancy, no other range upgrades.
urumi: 20% ranged resistance, hp increased to 320, damage to 20, aoe increased by 1, bonus vs heavy infantry increased to x2 from x1.75, increased to x3 in industrial age, move speed increased to 5.5. pop cost reduced to 1, increased bounty.

zamb 20% melee resist, sowar 20% ranged resist.

Agra fort has same base stats at age 2, fort base stats in age 3, fort +50% upgrades in age 4, and fort +100% in imperial age. No longer has an upgrade cost, auto upgrades on ageup.

Ottoman vill consulate tech now also ships an imam and enables them to be trained. Now has an infinite 1 bombard tech option.

2 Likes

Man, with all the the due respected, I stopped reading there.

How about we gave Spain 2 falconets in age 2 as well?

4 Likes

Ok, now I read the whole 3 topics that you wrote. Now maybe I should do a decent comment instead of just bitchy about buffing up even more the Spanish Logistician.

There are lot of propositions actually, some are good, some are broken and some are some too harsh nerfs. But I guess this is normal when there is this volume of propositions.

Where all of this came from?

equating an extra dog per age1 shipment with age 2 falconets is extreme hyperbole.

I’ve tested the spanish logistician quite a bit and it feels like a meme strategy, like dopple/grenadier/flail elephant rushes or otto livestock boom. has it been succeeding in tournaments, or has a large win streak with a streamer? I’ve never seen it succeed in a serious match against me. it doesn’t seem to be a viable 1v1 politician like most logistician choices, and unlike the others its also not very interesting at all.

I don’t understand the Spanish logistician comment, but this is mainly about getting a fresh new meta into the game and allow new strats to come into play. having the same units and build orders be the most optimal way to play for years can be suffocating, its nice to have a shakeup to experiment with new options and open up new playstyles every now and then.

its also about making defensive buildings focused more on damage than survivability, sharply defining cavalry from infantry through siege and mobility, and reducing the amount of stat bonuses that comes from cards and big buttons to roughly 30-40% for either hp and damage.

1 Like

Not every strategy needs to be used in competitive games to be considered viable. By definition, competitive games will comprise of a selected few strategies which are the most safe, and generally do good in all situations. That’s the beauty of so called ‘meme strategies’.

No, logistician/flail rush/revolt will not be played about 90% of times in serious competitive games. Does it make them any less fun to pull off? NO.

Think about it for a second. Suppose Otto revolt was a viable strategy most of the times, you will only see revolts Otto revolt in every competitive game. But now your problem isn’t solved! That civ went back to only one competitive strategy!

You are already provided with lots of options by the game to do so. Ever tried playing with rajputs and jat lancers? Early native tp? Petard rush? Just walling up with ports with lots of outposts? Spamming outposts with usa? FI with japan for industrial consulate units? Aztec age2 JPK cheese?
None of these are viable in competitive meta, because you cannot catch your opponent offguard in tournament games. In general ranked games, you can carry most of these out. And you will feel like a god if you win with these!

Explore the game. Try to use underused units instead of asking for entirely new things.

1 Like

I’m not sure what the point of your reply is. the entire post is about enabling new metas, which means giving weaker or obscure strategies a chance to shine vs established ones. if current non-meta strategies continue to be traps and inferior to the already established meta, there is no reason to utilize them and the meta stays the same.

there was already a sizable meta shift going from vanilla to tad, and a smaller one going from tad to de. these enabled some new build orders to have a chance and deepen the strategic choices you can make. further changing it up in a smart way will keep things fresh and allow previous unusable strategies to shine while still allowing old strategies to succeed.

That’s what I’m trying to say. Your problem now is ’ their is only one meta and it gets boring’. Your solution is ’ add new meta and strategies’. You are expecting multiple metas for each civ.

But the truth is with new meta. every civ will slowly adapt to new meta until it becomes the one and only meta. So, your original problem didn’t go away.

Even with new stuff, every civ will settle into the ONE most safe strategy no matter how hard you try.

2 Likes

this is not true, it is possible to have several different viable strategies depending on map and matchups, and currently most civs have more than one optimal bo. it is possible to expand the amount of viable build orders a civ has access to with proper scouting and matchups without making current ones obsolete. just look at current vanilla civ gameplay(for the most part), or at other games such as starcraft. there is no single ONE strategy that is always the correct answer. however for de there are fewer than is ideal.

by creating an environment to let new metas shine we can have more than the current number of correct choices if you scout and react properly, with more pathways to victory that depend on how skillfully you execute and adapt rather than just doing the same strategies over and over.

This is a ton changes. What is the goal though? What do all these changes accomplish to change the meta to? You have a ton of ideas which is awesome but really these are balance changes although you state they are not.

I think instead of a ton of very detailed changes, you would be better suited to first state
What you dont like about AoE3 in its current state
What you want AoE3 to be
And then list changes that make AoE3 to your desired state

Right now its just a massive amount of changes with zero analysis and amounts to massive rebalancing of the game for…what purpose?

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the specific changes are not important, and I don’t really care if they are implemented. its more to paint a direction of where to take the game.

making defensive buildings much easier to tear down with heavy infantry and siege units by halving their hp, but also double their damage output to make them a more threatening point defense when supported by other units.

reducing the amount of hp and damage boosts from big buttons and cards and combining them with other affects, meaning units perform closer to their base stats and reducing power creep while giving more card space in the early game to resource crates and unit shipments, making them less of a trap for new players.

emphasizing mobility vs siege with cavalry, increasing the need for heavy infantry and siege units for cav heavy armies to take down structures, while rewarding map control and allowing players to outmaneuver slower armies. this gives cav majority armies clear strength and weakness.

emphasizing the importance of distancing and melee vs ranged by removing melee bonuses from dedicated ranged units and increasing the move speed of melee units in general.

emphasizing civilization strength and weakness, to create more varied strategies and opportunities unique to each civilization. reducing their reliance on cards to access those strength and make them easier to use.

reducing most units resistance to 20%, again emphasizing distancing and correct target fire, making mistakes with army placements more punishing and increasing the importance of scouting, terrain advantages and micro.

adding around 30 seconds to a 1 minute and a half to age ups, creating a bigger opportunity to punish investing in aging up. increase rewards from later age ups to still maintain a good balance of risk/reward.

ensuring that all age up politicians have at least one use case where they are not a trap option, adjusting dominant ones such as quartermaster and buffing terrible ones as well.

streamlining most units to food and gold, making them easier to manage both early and late game and easier to macro into an age up(tomahawks, longbowman, and similair units).

giving units that don’t have a place in the meta a helping hand, so that they may see some play.

It’s was the intention. But I actually think that a dog per shipment is even stronger then 2 falconets on age 2, because once you kill the falconets it’s over, but with a Logistician build you would get dog after dog out that now have 10% more stats. This is a incredible abusable mechanic.

Spanish Logistician is making civilizations that depends on early game pushes (Russia, India, Ottomans, Aztecs and even China to some extent) look like meme civilizations.

And the main person that I know that is beating everyone with the Logistician is Don_Artie.

We’ve found through Sweden that falconets in age 2 aren’t as OP as they seem on paper

I want the current meta to change since it sucks to play currently. its far too defensive, repetitive and boring and kills the drive to play multiplayer in de. if I had joined aoe3 during this meta I would not have stuck around the games multiplayer for long. I’ve recently played several games of vanilla and remembered why I loved the multiplayer in aoe3 till hackers came and reminded me why I stopped playing the online mode 4-6 years ago. vanilla had its fault, mainly dragoon ranged resistance and light infantry performance vs heavy cav/everything but dragoons, but the rest of it was fun enough that you could overlook it.

DE does a lot of things right in the single player side, but aside from dedicated servers its just a much worse experience than Vanilla for multiplayer, and that’s not including things like multiplayer/social interface, ranks and reconnect options.

and as someone who loves the competitive side of multiplayer and seek expertise over other games such as StarCraft, league of legends, total war and even games like destiny, apex and battlefield, I have 0 interest currently in the ranked que of aoe3-de. this is due to the constant crashing/freezing and bugs with no reconnect, the non-existent social features which harms making new friends and playing together, the cheating/oos which has only been partially fixed, a small player base that seemingly hasn’t played the most basic tutorials and with no consistent way to find competitive matches, and to top all of that off is a meta which is dull and not fun to play. after 8 month one of these is probably easier to fix than the other, and its also one of the more important ones as well.

its one of the reasons me and alot of vanilla players including most of my clan mates didn’t switch to ep when the choice was either ep or continue playing with the increasing hacker infestation. ep required us to grind games through an absurdly imbalanced and cheesy tad experience filled with hackers, deccan, formation bugs like alt-d, native bs, deccan, japan and india.

and also even more bugs and terrible design choices like 15%+ unit upgrades/sioux warchief/2 pop cuirs and other pop reduction cards/4 axe rider shipment/deccan/unction and tepee aura stacking/shrines/siege dance/japanese monks/age 2 evening star shipment/light infantry tag for aztec cav units/10k+hp sioux warchief running past your army to one shot artillery with aoe only to respawn 10 seconds later and other dance bs/age 1 messenger politician, and bow riders. only to find a significantly smaller player base, alot of the same bs, and a movement towards the current boring defensive meta just to avoid the hackers we have to grind through in tad to get a decent/any matches on the patch, whose most interesting balance change was reducing dragoon range resistance(deserved and not enough) and new maps. the switch was just not worth the effort and the end result most of us just moved on to other games, and I feel like quitting the multiplayer aspect of aoe3 de as well.

its harder and harder to find reasons to play online in aoe3de, and if i had a wish for this game it would be to invest some time in polishing vanilla: remove hacks and oos. remove training cards and standardize church train upgrades to 60%, change light cav resistance to 20% melee and light infantry resistance to 20% ranged. give heavy cav malus to light infantry and change abus/grenadier malus to heavy cav only. make Native American warriors cost pure food and remove their large stat cards. change church, docks and livestock pens to 100 wood, change tp, arsenal and foundry costs to 200. reduce ottoman mosque upgrade costs by 75%. halve cav siege damage, and increase decks to 25 cards.

It wouldn’t be perfect but it would be great, and I would play vanilla multiplayer online so much I wouldn’t have time for any other online game, and come back to de when single player content drops.

tldr: the current meta sucks. change it to increase early interaction, punish micro mistakes and reward aggression. its not a balance patch because its focus isn’t on balance, its on making the optimal multiplayer gameplay more fun and closer to vanilla.

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Now decks have 25 cards and heavy cavalry must defeat light infantry. With your system light infantry would be more OP than now lol. I supposed that Skirmishers are the light infantry for you.

there’s probably a language issue here. malus means penalty, so giving a heavy cav penalty to light infantry means light infantry deal less damage to heavy cav. in vanilla there was no penalty so light infantry where stronger, one of the two big balance problems in vanilla aside from maps.

vanilla only had 20 cards, and frankly if hackers are removed I wouldn’t mind the current limit too much. its gameplay would still be superior.

I dont understand his point, why he is talking about Vanilla, its a thing from 15 years ago and DE have some of that changes like cheaper mosque or 25cards.
Devs wont be care about Vanilla or TAD.

the point is that vanilla did some things better than its remake in regards to pvp, such as its interface, its more balanced and weaker cards, and a more aggressive and rewarding game style and focus on map control rather than turtling.

these are things I hope de will adopt among other changes to make a more fun and engaging meta. meanwhile patching out hacks in legacy will also do so much to help the pvp experience there and bring in lots of goodwill.