Well, the Euro natives are here. Have to say, Royal Houses was a clever way of adding theme, so points for theming. And they certainly didn’t skimp on the value, each has 4 techs, an infinite big button ability, and at least 2 trainable units.
Does this change my opinion on Legacy natives? Not really. I still think they should be kept mostly the same, with only minor changes to individual units and techs here and there.
Considering we now have good african natives and they even went further by creating euro natives, I think it’s now safe to say that is guaranteed they will rework Legacy Natives. It’s a matter of time.
As far as their design style goes, I think they will simply add more techs and rework the units (the African Natives should be the guidelines).
And I’m gladly surprised with the direction they went with the “Euro-natives”: they have less improvements but that is counter-balanced by the fact they have a passive ability and their units are far stronger than the usual natives.
I used to think that the possibilities of being creative had reached a limit when I was thinking about my proposals and then the Royal Houses showed me several things beyond what I had imagined. So kudos to the devs !
If they make the current units useful by improving their stats or adjusting their prices, and altering the current technologies a bit to improve their viability I’d be fine, but in my opinion a facelift would be fine for me.
Just as Paradox improves the base game, and older DLC for its games to harmonize with more current content, FE and TM could absorb this same philosophy.
Call me nostalgic, but I’m perfectly fine with Legacy nats design wise. They’re simple and straightforward, but effective. And if there’s been significant power creep, we can adjust some numbers here and there.
Yep. Beyond more techs I’m expecting a small change to the “meh units” (on top of stats change). Something like:
Nothing too fancy. Just a small perk to make them look more than re- skins of usual units as the African natives do.
I think they need a buff
And there’s still too few minor civs for south america
What is an “active ability”? Is it the kind you need to activate manually or is it the kind that activates automatically?
Because if it’s the latter, the correct term is “passive”.
Exactly as you described, active as in “activate manually”
After getting to try out the Royal Houses first hand, I can say they’re nice additions to the game. Sure they’re pretty overtuned (since nobody uses natives) but the devs have carved out new and interesting techs and were successfully able to differentiate 5 musketeers and 5-ish skirmishers without any of them feeling too bland. However, I wanted to compile some missed opportunities. These aren’t gonna be new ideas per se, just fixes suggested based on potential oversights/bugs.
Bourbon:
The Royal Horseman displays 4 pop when in the TP but is functionally 5 pop in game. You can even see the your population increase by one from when it’s in queue to when it spawns. This seems like a legit bug and should probably be corrected.
Habsburg:
When you double click Mounted Infantry it also selects any Dismounted Infantry on screen. There’s probably no way to fix this, especially given they’re promotion units, but this is more a heads-up for any players who aren’t practiced with control groups.
Hanover:
I find it funny that the description of “Act of Union” says the Hanover Flag will spawn a “random” English, Scottish, and Irish merc because, as near as I can tell, it will always spawn a Harquebusier, a Highlander, and a Brigadier as those are the only English, Scottish, and Irish mercs. Let me know if I’m forgetting any, but it feels like most of the Euro mercs are German or French.
Also, the Factory from Victorian Age is technically a different unit from normal Factories, but this means it isn’t selected when you double click the regular Factories.
Phanar:
The Evzone techs in the Athos Monastery very strictly respect built limits. That is, if even you would go over the build limit the tech fails to activate. So for example, if you have 9 Evzone and your Hero dies, then the 2 Evzone don’t spawn. This is also true of the tech that gives 1 Evzone for every 2 buildings you have. I guess it’s conceivable these techs could be abused, but I’d prefer it to paying 1500c for nothing to happen.
I’ve talked about this in greater detail in the Royal House thread, but I think Priests and equivalent healing units should be able to rebuild Athos Monasteries. I can appreciate them being irreplaceable as incentive to defend them, but I’d prefer to be able to reposition them so as to better heal my army or else to gather more coin.
Also the Greek Revolution ability doesn’t seem to activate for me unless it’s rank 5 or above. I think this is intentional to ensure a small mass of Sacred Banders and I don’t think it should necessarily be changed, moreso looking for clarification.
Oldenburg:
The Huntsman gathers from hunts (and berries) at the speed of a normal villager, not a CDB despite their other similarities. Personally I feel like that’s a bit low for their cost and would prefer it boosted to Pilgrim levels (1.1x vil base rates). I also am kinda weirded out they can’t construct buildings but it’s whatever, that probably should stay the same. The biggest oversight for me is the Huntsmen aren’t affected by Oldenburg’s own tech Hunting Expeditions. They should generate coin when hunting like all other vils.
The Hunter doesn’t batch train despite no longer being able to gather resources. Not sure if this is related to them still being affected by villager upgrades, but this makes them much harder to mass, especially in the late game. 100% my most wanted fix.
I haven’t yet tested out every “defensive” building with the coin trickle, but there are a couple of oddities. Outposts trickle .25c/s which makes for a good enough base rate. This is mirrored in Watch Towers and War Huts. Weirdly, Forts trickle .73c/s which isn’t quite 3x the outpost rate for some reason. Incan Strongholds trickle .35c/s, but African Palaces only trickle .25c/s. Kalankas don’t trickle anything, which I suppose is fair if since they don’t attack, but they’re definitely counted as a defensive building in other contexts. I don’t really have an opinion on changing any one of these (maybe make the Fort a round .75) but just wanted to point out the weirdness. Interested to have a look at the rest of the buildings…
Vasa:
The Royal Arquebusier is probably the only unit of the new Royal Houses anyone could call underpowered. Not sure what if anything I’d change, but it just seems to have odd stats all around.
The Winged Hussar from the tech have different bonuses from the ones you can normally train.
I was having a hard time judging the speed their big button charges with. Does the the charge rate speed up the more ranks it has?
Wittelsbach:
Like Vasa, I was having a hard time judging the charge time of the big button. Also, it doesn’t seem like it has an upper limit, can it just keep building forever?
I also noticed the Mountain Troopers from the big button don’t have the promotion ability the normal units have.
The idea is not to use them 100/100% of the time, the idea is that they are useful if you decide to use them, and I think that real houses comply with this. Also many African minor factions and some Asian and American natives, but it seems very citutional for most civilizations that are not Incas, French, Mexican or USA and Africans.
That’s why I think a general rework is necessary so that the average civilization can ally in a way that is worth the risk. [Suggestion–rework] Natives or minor factions
well the pup is bringing some interesting native changes.
first, the new minor civ: the Tengri
They seem an interesting mishmash of old ideas but remixed in a good way.
The Tatar Archer is an interesting unit, if a bit pricey for it’s strength. Coming so soon off the heels of the Lipka Tatar, I think the devs did a decent job differentiating the two speedy quick-firing cav archers (this is more important than, say, Cherokee vs Klamath because Jagielion and Tengri can appear on the same map, besides Unknown). Whereas the Lipka deals high damage vs everything, the Tengri seemingly only hard counters other cav and is rather weak vs other units. The Lipka also has a very low frame delay (fires instantly) while the Tengri fires its first shot slower, tho still before other cav archers. Otherwise, their stats are quite similar.
The Tengri Wolf is also a neat spin, an anti-pet pet. It’s deceptively strong, and hopefully a decent answer to Spanish war dogs (although I suppose Spain could make some themselves).
Their techs are a tad generic, and arguably underpowered but at least they’re cheap:
100f 100c: -10% train time for cav and shock inf. On its face this is a worse bonus than similar techs from Cheyenne and Quecha, but it does cost much less and is available starting age 1 so conceivably a player could make use of it much sooner.
150w 150c: ships 1 semi-fattened yak per 3 min up to 30 min. This is kinda a worse version of the Sufi fattened goat tech (the yaks come with 200f but can fatten more up to 400f) but again it’s noticeably cheaper, although it costs wood rather than food.
350f 350c: the description says it improves movement speed and RoF for cav and pets, but it currently only improves RoF. Also it’s bugged in the pup for ranged cav, or at least the display is bugged. Still a neat tech, if both effects come it’ll be decently priced. I find it interesting the devs recently have been messing with RoF more and more, with various techs, auras, and other abilities making units fire faster. That improves dps on paper, but fights can be so micro intensive in AoE 3 I wonder how many players notice a difference…
There were some other changes to existing nats. Cheyenne Riders have had their model redone with the Lakota overhaul. Navajo Rifleman have had their stats reverted to their Legacy stats but with +4 range. This means they have +10 hp and -10w cost, but much less attack. They’re also back to being a true skirmisher, with bonuses vs HI and LRC and all relevant tags. I find it funny the devs have spent DE lightly tinkering with the Navajo here and there, and have now apparently thrown up their hands in defeat. Maybe this is in response to people raiding with the Mexican card?
As part of the change to Sufi, the War Elephant has been moved to the Bhakti TP. I’m kinda cold on this change, it’s a bit strange having one nat with 2 units that basically fulfil the same function: cavalry with an anti-light infantry focus. I think the preferred alternative would be to add them to the Udasi temple instead. Yeah it might be a bit thematically questionably, but no more so than sticking them in Bhakti. And from a gameplay standpoint it feels nicer imo. Bhakti is already one of the more used nats, they don’t need a “buff” at least not in this way. Whereas, Udasi are def an unpopular nat which would benefit from the extra unit. Plus the Chakram pairs well with the War Elephant, the two cover eachothers weaknesses well enough. Short of making a whole new nat for War Eles (which maybe defeats the point of the change), I think switching them from Bhakti to Udasi would be more sensible.
Sufi has had their War Elephants replaced with a new unit, the Qizilbash, which is kinda a strange unit. They’re described as a Lancer-type unit, as they counter all infantry in melee. But they only have 2x vs infantry so it isn’t as hard of a counter as Spanish Lancers. This is offset by the fact they also have a bow attack. It has no multipliers, but it allows the unit to raid and kite. For some reason it doesn’t get extra range from RCC, I assume that’s a bug tho. They seem like a unit that you have to pay attention to, will be interesting to see how they’re used.
Arguably the biggest change is the new Alliance mechanic. It’s a bit hard to explain if you haven’t seen it in game, but basically you can walk up to a native settlement and “capture” it, like a KotH Monument or a Silk Road TP. It gives some LoS, but you can’t train any units or research techs until you build a TP proper. You can still build it the old-fashioned way, but there’s a new option to have the TP auto generate slowly for 100f 100w (rather than 200w). Note this still respects the exclusion ring of the opponent’s starting TC. Once the TP is bought in that way, you can still use an Explorer to construct it more quickly that by itself, although it’s still slower than placing it with a unit the old way. And finally, when the TP is build, it now trickles xp at a rate of .35/s or half that of a Church. I know a lot of people in this thread wanted this change, and it was one I was apprehensive about, but it seems to be slight enough that it won’t be op.
People may see this as a step up, but I think so only in that it’s more than nothing (not that this is my preferred approach to buffing nats anyway). tbh, I struggle to see the utility in the Alliance mechanic. Beyond the LoS, it doesn’t seem to offer anything in itself, only a roundabout way to make nat TPs “cheaper” than Trade Route ones. And while that plus the xp trickle might make more players open the door idk how many will bother to use the main feature: the units and techs. We’ll see tho.
Also: I can confirm the new Tengri TP does appear on Unknown… as well as the Legacy minor Aztec, Lakota, and Haude!!!
I think that 2 types of tp had been proposed for different cases (route TP/native TP). I think it was a good idea, but the problem was the slot in the villagers interface, so this was a good way to fix it with the auto build and capture system.
This is a deceptively strong tech that’s much better than +10% attack since it is multiplicative not additive. A normal attack boost upgrade or card is applied to the base attack stat. But a boost to RoF increases based off your current attack stat. It basically makes all your cards and upgrades that boost attack 10% better.
For a few upgrades, changing RoF is an okay gimmick. But I’m not a fan of the amount they’ve been messing with it on unit base stats. It makes unit comparisons at a glance much more difficult which makes the game less accessible for inexperienced players.
Units like Line Infantry have a 2.7 RoF, which is 11% better than if they had a normal 3 RoF. It’s just unnecessarily confusing when they could have just increased its stats by 11%.
They could copy one of the rare innovative features from AoE4 for a unique tech. Enabling an ability like the Khan’s Scouting Falcon would be great.
Enables your explorer to use the Scouting Falcon ability which deploys a falcon that provides LOS over an area (basically a stationary version of the Balloon ability).
The Mongol Scout unit could also have the ability by default to make it a bit more unique.
I made a separate topic for that, but I think religious site unit language could be tied to the map/region you’re playing in
So for example, Sufi units could spek Arab if created in an African map or in Fertile Crescent, speak Indian if created in Indian maps, and so on.
The choice of Tiger Claw +War Elephant is really odd. I think the same. It would’ve been a better idea now to move War Elephants to a new minor civ. How Bhakti is"already one of the more used nats"? Where did you get this data from?
I’m fine with natives and mercs having gimmicks but I’m not kind of worried after the Knights of Meditarrean DLC.
Those european natives feel like they come from a MOBA. Not even Age of Mythology had so many units that would break the pattern of their own class and have gimmicks like the ones from the last 3 DLCs. I’m actually in favor of increasing the cost of those European improvements.
This “capture” of socket is not an idea that I had ever read or heard about it. It’s definitely better than our current only way to ally with natives. It looks awkward at first:
So you send a random unit, you wait, you slowly convert it, you capture it …but you still can’t do anything, then you can choose to autommatically set up a NTP for 100f, 100w but it’s very slowly built. And in the mean time, someone may come before you capture it and fight to recapture it? Well, we’ll see it.
It’s probably a bypass to have a NTP without making it cheaper, so there is most certainly a restriction in coding to make the same building (TPs) having different costs in AOE3. Plus, they’re respecting the old school way of building a NTP (it’s expensive but it’s faster).
I’m wondering if there is an easier way to do that without throwing away the need of basic TPs. Perhaps having an exclusive NTP travois (out of Explorer & Embassy) that are cheaper (100f, 100w) but build NTPs much slower? I feel it would’ve been much more simple and effective than the “conversion” method.
Their techs are really mediocre and recycled by the report of ScEvolution. Hopefully they will be reworked. I like this tech.
You can have a unit, such as an explorer, build the foundation once you’ve bought the 100f 100w TP. It’s not as fast as the 200w TP, but it’s built in half the time of letting it auto build. You can also build your own TP even over someone else’s captured socket as long as they aren’t actively building it afaik.
Well, the Veteran upgrade for Royal Houses is actually in line with the cost of the Elite upgrade for natives with 2 units (125w 125c vs 150w 100c), although it’s funny since the veteran upgrade only affects the age 2 unit (the age 3 unit is already Veteran). The only exceptions being Jagielion, where both units are age 2, and Hannover, who has 3 units 2 of which are age 2.
But the Guard upgrade (350w 350c) is priced in line with the 1 unit Champion upgrade (400w 300c) rather than the 2 unit (500w 400c) so I wouldn’t mind a small increase either (e.g. 450w 450c). Still, I’m not convinced this is either a major source of brokenness or a bottleneck keeping the units from being viable, so any change would be based on parity.
Well, I don’t have any usage data or anything, it mainly comes from anecdotal observation. Still, the Tiger Claw is 100% one of the strongest of the Legacy nats and the techs are all good. The berry tech in particular, while niche, is powerful and cheap enough to have a major impact in the right situation.
As for the issue of the War Elephant, it’s nice they didn’t remove it from game but it’s certainly an odd situation. I get having an Indian unit far from the Indian subcontinent, and the other Indian nats, is thematically weird. Having a new minor civ may be the optimal solution, but in some ways defeats the point of the change (why not make a new nat around the Qizilbash?). Maybe there’s a new War Elephant nat coming at some point, since they just introduced a new Asian nat randomly. But if this is meant as a permanent change, I still think the more sensible choice is to move them to Udasi. The choice would be about the same weight thematically but prove more satisfying from a gameplay standpoint I think. War Elephant + Chakram feels a more natural comp than War Elephant + Tiger Claw.
Or maybe that was the point? To stop any native from becoming too strong? Not like that’s the entire design of the Royal Houses… Maybe it’s just relative to the other Asian nats.
I’m mostly fine with the techs as presented. I agree they’re not the most original, but they’re in a unique combination and their cheap prices mean they’re very likely to be picked up.
If I were to play around with their balance rather than their concept, It’d look something like this:
100f 100c = -10% cav train time → 150f 150c = -15% cav & shock inf train time
The similar techs in Cheyenne and Quecha are found on different continents, so you’ll only ever get both on Unknown. I’m mostly fine with overlapping techs when they minor civs themselves never overlap (Zen/Zapotec, Vasa/Mapuche, Cree/Navajo etc). 150 for 15% seems still affordable but more impactful. I could see 200 for 20% but maybe that’d be too much. Also I’m pretty sure it only affects cav atm, so adding shock inf is a no brainer.
150w 150c = 200f Yak per 3 min to 30 min → 150w 150c = 200f Yak per 2 min to 30 min
This tech feels very similar to the Sufi goat tech, but even tho they both appear on the same maps I’m hesitant to remove it since it’s thematically appropriate. It compares somewhat favorably to the Sufi tech, giving less food but being cheaper. I’d either bump up the interval of the Yaks going up or improve their food from 200f to 250f.
350f 350c = -10% cav & pet RoF → 350f 350 -10% cav & pet RoF; +5% cav speed +10% pet speed
Here I’m more or less predicting the final effect based on what I experienced in game and assuming this tech still had some bugs to fix. Here I’m intentionally leaving out shock inf, but maybe you think I shouldn’t.