I wish they would add more diversity to old civilisations instead of adding new ones.
Lords of the West was the first of 6 extensions that only added unique units. I wish the game would add some variation to old civilisations while rounding them up with new units and technologies.
I like units like the Battle Elephants, Steppe Lancers or Eagle Warrior that are only available to a small group of civilisations.
That also kinda applies to units like Paladins as they are only available to one none European civilisation. They add variety while not breaking game balance.
Battle Elephants, Steppe Lancers or Eagle Warriors and Paladins have similar roles but play differently and make civilisations more interesting. For some civilisation Camel Riders have similar role.
I wish the game had more units to increase diversity of older civilisations.
Some ideas: Eastern Spearman:
None trash unit that has higher base stats and base armour (1/1) that is good against cavalry but more all round than the classic Spearman line. Still loses against Militia line in 1 to 1.
In many places Spearman where the main unit of an army and also had good equipment.
Eastern Swordsman
Similar to Militia line but more fragile but deals small AoE damage.
Making none European infantry less knight like and more light units.
Eastern Bowman:
Higher rate of fire (1.5) but lower attack(4/5) than Crossbow/Arbalester.
In most parts of the world archers where more common than crossbows.
(Middle) Eastern Cavalry:
Fast cavalry (1.45) with good attack (10/12) and decent HP (100/120) but low armour (0/0).
They have more survivability than a Steppe Lancer but don’t have the extra range and cost a little more.
Essentially being an alternative to the Cavalier for none European civilisations.
Yurt
Replaces houses for nomadic civilisations. It cost less, is constructed faster but has less hitpoints. Also gives 5 population.
Some variation could be added with technologies like +1 range for Pikeman that are only available to a small group of civilisations.
Or a technology that makes stray arrows have 100% on other targets instead of 50%. Maybe mutually exclusive to Thumb Ring for balance reasons.
Generally nothing game breaking that would heavily change balance but more adding slight varieties.
The ones I posted are just some ideas. Generally units or technologies that won’t confuse people or make the game more complicated as they behave similar to existing units but still feel different enough to add some variety.
Also adding the possibility to make culturally similar civilisations share unique features like it’s already in the game with the Battle Elephants.
Unique skins like the American Monk should also be used more often like there already is a Imam and a Priest in the game, why not use those skins?
I get why units should be reconcilable but they look similar enough.
Some of these suggestions could be alternate units in the tree tech. For instance, the Asian archer you mention could be an alternative to arbalests that you research from crossbow
With this suggestion AoE 2, the game will be AoE 5. Better to have regional skins instead of reworking their “diversity”. Just imagine in team game, with a mixture of civs you have to exactly know who’s who in the heat of battle.
I was thinking about adding 1 unit or 1 technology to most of the old civilisations not replacing all units.
Not making AoE5 out of it.
I’m not against regional skins.
Units like the Cavalier are the strongest cavalry unit for most none Europeans but they look very much like a European Knight.
Adding more generic units is pointless you already have a simple tech tree which most are familiar with.cosmatic changes like new monk skins or house are fine as they dont mess up the core game.
New civilizations having new mechanics is the way to go rather than messing up traditional civis.
I feel this is a slippery slope into turning AOE2 into a hybrid of AOK/AOC and AOEIII. Chinese/Japanese/Koreans would have a different version of the same unit type with different stats etc. Camel civs would lose knights but gain bonuses to be a knight replacement, while knight civs would not have camels. Doesn’t sound like a great thing to balance.
New civilisations keep repeating themselves or have to do more and more crazy things like a civilisations where all unique technologies are a one time effect thing.
Adding new civilisations makes the old ones more boring. Either they lose something they were unique for like Mongols being the best Cavalry Archer civilisation by fare (Turks didn’t have the unique technology back than) and over the time more and more civilisations with a focus on cavalry archers were added to the game.
The first The Conquerors fixed that by giving each civilisation a unique technology.
The Forgotten give each civilisation a second unique technology.
But after that there were only new civilisations added while old ones where just rebalanced. Only the Mongols did get the Steppe Lancer but the Indians still don’t have the Battle Elephant.
I don’t even want every civilisation to get something completely unique. I want a hand full of new units and technologies that are each shared but a hand full of civilisations so that each civilisation gets 1 or 2 new things.
Oh no there is a feature from AoE3 that means it will ruin AoE2.
I feel like half of AoE2 fans just hate everything that comes from AoE3 without thinking about it.
My idea would have been the opposite. Chinese, Japanese and Koreans get the same new unit but only they get it making them feel similar to each other but more different to others.
Like the South East Asians or the Americans already do.
That was an example unit that wasn’t supposed to be given to all camel civilisations. It was more a replacement to the Cavalier that they already have that isn’t better overall but fitting on more.
Saracens don’t have the Cavalier so if they would get the new cavalry unit that would make them stronger so either they don’t get or they would lose something else.
I am personally fine with adding AOE3 stuff into AOE2 as long as it does not turn into AOE3’s balance disaster (10x dmg to ships? 4x to artillery? Counter intuitive counters?). Heck, those new mechanics motivates me to try out some super silly low elo stuff just to see how it works in practice.
However, for a lot of long time AOE2 players, they feel AOE2 should stick to AOC/AOK instead of moving forward. They are ok to feel that way. It’s just that they will gradually be phased out like old people leaving the stage. It will take some time.
You are talking about the Culverin? That’s likely the most extreme unit in the game regarding it’s modifiers.
AoE3 DE is a good balance. Most people are absolutely viable on pro level.
What counters are counter intuitive? Like Light (ranged) cavalry countering heavy cavalry? Skirmishers countering heavy infantry or light cavalry? That is a bit more exaggerated than in history but that’s true for AoE2 as well.
I’m likely older than most of the loud AoE2 fans that want to ruin AoE4 with requesting them to use 20 years old game design and hate anything that AoE3 did.
Balance is something very much needed for the game rather than adding new content.
Expansion civis trying out new things is natural progression.dont like the change dont buy the expansion simple.
New content can be used to balance the game.
Like the Halberdier or Hussars added in the Conquerors.
But with so many civilisations can never be balanced.
Game is more balanced that ever before and no need to add more things to balance you can just tweek and adjust.
Also the conquerors expansion added meso civis without stables and huns with no houses so its a change from the core game just like the newest expansion.
what is the point of this? what is it supposed to do differently to other units? it needs to target low armour targets in order to get the full benefit… in a way we already have the plumed archer. the arb line is also basically already this relative to all other archers, since it immediately suffers against anything with more than 1 armour, while there are lower ROF higher damage archers in the form of GC, CKN, CA etc…
you mean a malian light cav or camel? literally go look at the stats on a farimba camel and then look at what you asked for
my point is a lot of your units exist already in various permeations … what makes yours any more unique just the fact that they are available to more civs?
i mean it would be cool if we had 100x new things but at what cost? in stead of having remarkably similar version of what we already have why not get cool new things like a super tanky infantry that can build combination rax and towers… which do you think is going to draw in more players? and how do you justify the cost?
people are being super salty about buying NEW CIVS… imagine asking them to buy new units for their existing civs…
Yes.
It’s a boring game of every civilisation is a few different varieties of buffs to the same units plus 1 unique unit.
That was ok when the number of civilisations was low but now new civilisations have to be either so different that the old ones feel boring or feel like they’ve already been there.
The argument against different civilisations having different units is always that it makes the game more complicated. But than the game has the same unit with very different stats like Malians getting 5 attack for their cavalry while their infantry gets +3 piercing armour. Those are basically different units already they just look like European units.
I never said that they should sell new units to old civilisations. You basically saying that it’s just impossible because its not easy to monetize?
You seem to be a very smart person to know this. Because you are smart, then also know that one day you’ll be “old” too, and the hip new children of that day shall seek to phase you out of the earthly things you love to make more room for themselves. And so in a day like that you ought to remember a day like this, so that you might curb the fussing you will have and not turn on previously discovered wisdom.