My latest balance suggestions

You just cannot nerf CKN, as long as Arbalester is being picked over CKN every single game (unless its Camels/Cavalier). You want to increase diversity, to pull Chinese out of this generic Arbs civ state.

The whole point about Serjeants is the fact they can fight under arrow fire unlike most other Infantries, they aren’t designed to be a Berserk which mans up against Infantry units in a face to face combat.
They just need to make tower-rush / Donjon rush viable again and then this unit will get the justice it needs.

2 Likes

Considering the latest nerf on walling, it wouldn’t be that broken actually…

With a 50% less building time (or built 100% faster, depending on which wording you prefer…) it would be:

  • palisade tiles would take 3.5 seconds instead of 7s.
  • stone tiles would take 5 seconds instead of 10s.

It’s a decent eco bonus for arabia and open maps, and an useless bonus for water and arena.

They have a bonus against archers, so let’s not overdo it.

Like basically every other civ who prefer standard units over UU… but apart from that, the CKN is a incredibly strong unit and it have a ridiculously low cost for what it gives.

Well they’re already going to be buffed so let’s see how the buff do.

I don’t like instant techs so I don’t like this change. What I think bohemians need to start with is some nerf for their cheeses on arena, maybe removing the -100 woord cost of monastries but I don’t have a strong opinion on this.

I think the idea here is to nerf FR, but I don’t like the removal of supplies. With cavalry civs that lack strong ranged options you kinda need a good infantry transition to deal with camels/halbs at some point, or even some military option to field when gold runs low and it’s hard to keep heavy cav production.

I would prefer a rework of FR instead.

Agree

I’m not sure about this, Chinese already have arbalest and nerfing Chu Ko Nu probably would just push them into that direction even more.

I think that a shared unique unit that requires a bigilion upgrades is a bad idea to begin with, since the civs that can make use of kipchacks are very few and basically all of them have their own CA units which often are superior. Probably the tech should be changed.

I actually like this one.

About TB change, I would prefer an Inca change that improves their late game (I have no strong ideas how though, maybe giving them the malian 30% longer lasting gold mines), but your idea is kinda fine.

Kamayuk change it’s not needed imho, they’re going to get buffed already and I think it’s a pretty underrated unit very good in melee combat in numbers.

Fine

I don’t like walls changes, I’m not a fan in general of walling bonuses since there are already quite a lot of civs defensively oriented.

I have not a formed opinion on SE aswell, I don’t think it would be the worst change ever but I don’t see a real reason to make this change either.

Condo bonus vs eagles it’s not bad, I don’t think it’s necessarly needed but it might be fine. I don’t understand the bonus vs spears instead.

I think this is mostly to deal with cav/eagles. It’s not the worst idea ever but the potential for armored m@a opening followed up by armored archers and eventually even towers is very concerning and it’s not impossible that this changes strengthens even more their match-up versus archers thanks to their opening potential instead of making the civ more well rounded.

Folwark idea isn’t terrible, but keep in mind that folwark farms are by far the best farms in the game and the trade off for that is the additional risk of not farming around the TC. If you guarantee safety to their farmers in the early game you kinda break this trade off and it would end up being broken most likely.

About imp UT poles have received SE already in next patch to better deal with archers, so I would wait to see how that does.

I agree with squires, I don’t understand why portuguese don’t get access to the tech.

I don’t agree with faster researching techs, 50% is nuts and would help a lot on water.

I think the civ needs a way deeper rework tbh.

I’m not sure what this change should do for spanish

1 Like

A unit with high melee armor is not supposed to fight melee units? What should it fight then? Buildings? Archers? A worse Huskarl, then. Donjon rush viable? Donjons are made of paper and costs a ton of stone. And it’s pretty clear that devs don’t want trush strategies to be viable.

Despite I really do not like this kind of bonus, it seems to fit perfectly what the civ need (Arabia boost).

+1

Aztecs: ok
Bohemians: No, would make civ more 1-dimensional
Celts: Dont see, why this is needed
Chinese: Arbs are more common already, so CKN clearly shouldnt be nerfed more
Cumans: Funny idea, I do not think it’s too problematic, unless maybe on Gold Rush. At worst, it’s useless, but then it’s still no problem. Otoh Cumans have other problems
Frank: YES!
Inca: If TB also affects wheelbarrow and handcart, it might be too strong. Kamayuk bonus vs eagle sounds odd, since in 1v1 against meso you will probably almost make swords instead of kamayuks, which this bonus probably wouldnt change (even if kamayuks can get 1 more PA in post-imp)
Other than that, i agree that incas could be buffed. but your suggestions would mostly affect team games
Indians: ok
Italians: do not need a lategame buff, especially not condos. Faster built walls are ok to give them better eco, but that’s not necessary either imo
Koreans: Good idea. It helps their early game (MAA) and their pike-line vs cav - kinda exactly what they needed. Even if I had a different idea for that
Portuguese: Yes! It could be even faster then 50% imo. Squires is another good help. Otoh it was part of their identity for me that they are one of a few civs without squires
Sicilians: Yes! Their cav is way too strong, especially considering that they’re considered an infantry civ. No opinion on redemption though
Spanish: Ok. Not sure though, if that is too strong on arena

So in the time when Leiciai had 2 base PA yet people used Knights way more than Leiciai, yet Leiciai lost 1 PA, but why Chu Ko Nu must stay the same, despite having way high base attack in castle age.

Ive also switched to aoe4. Was in two of the betas. But really enjoying it. I love that they finally made a viable melee infantry civ. And at the same time proved how strong you can make infantry without them being remotely OP, yet peeps here were so against buffing militia line which is like 5x worse than the teutonic champskarls HRE field​:joy::joy::joy::joy:

Anyway some good suggestions. I like most of them, not sure about Frank’s. I say nerf them into the ground. Make them d tier for pros, just to get them to stop absolutely dominating the ladder.

I would still change the Chinese start to make them more viable for the player base instead of pandering to pros.

Celts buff is good. Wondering why it was never like that in the first place.

I don’t agree on the sicilians at all. Just reduce hauberk to 1/1 but don’t butcher their LC. Like you’re Forcing them into a KT only game.

1 Like

AoE4, you mean the game where no one makes non-spear infantry if they don’t get a huge bonus for them because they lose to xbows, knights, and can’t even be trained before age 3?

only infantry most civs makes it spears (does that sound familiar?) unless they get strong techs for their gold infantry (Does that sound familiar)? so i’m not really sure what you are talking about.

1 Like

Great list, I support almost all of it. The Bohemian crossbow to HC tranformation is a great idea, since that is a difficult transition to make.

The one thing I disagree with is making Sicilian Cavalier weaker against other Cavalry by losing armor. I don’t find the current Hauberk + Plate Barding to be a problem at all, since it only brings their Cavaliers up to Paladin level even when facing Arbalesters. Your suggestion would make Sicilian Cavaliers have the same Pierce Armor as generic Paladins, but with lower HP and attack.

2 Likes

ah yeah and i like this one, although isnt it maybe too powerful in castle age? because you can start massing archers from feudal, then pay a small food price (relative to the cost of HC) to get a load of HC

1 Like

We don’t need Memish Rev Electric Boogaloo 2 anyway.

2 Likes

I would suggest to allow Spanish, Portuguese, Italians and Koreans access to Fortified Palisade Wall with double wood cost and +1s building time of palisade wall in Feudal age. I think it’s fine for a few civs to be more viable in walling.

I really dislike the idea of wall bonuses, but fortified palisade walls can be a nice boost.

Also, I think that the extra building speed for Italian walls is very effective for what they need. Just to have an idea, @DoctBaghi how much villager time would you spare on average?

Sorry guys, I’m like super busy lately…

To answer your question @Sylux1000, I don’t have numbers right away, and I have zero time to test it.

Anyway, you can see how much vill time value by looking at SotL videos, and then look at how much cost walling your base (it’s an old video, but you just need to do the proportion). Basically, italians would save half of what SotL indicates in his video.

I’m sorry if I didn’t do the math, but really, I have very little free time, and I’m trying to spend what little free time trying out AoE4, so that’s why I’m not that much active in these sections of the forum.

I have just watched it. More or less half of the cost is build time. So, if the cost is 300 resources (sotl was estimating around 250) you spend 150 resources in build time.

The Italian bonus would be around 75 resources in the best case if set to 50%

If the bonus is set to 66% (I mean, a discount of 2/3 of the total build time), then it is around 100 resources. Again, in the best case.

Fair enough…

With the other 75 food of the cheaper age up it would be enough probably. Plus, there is the added benefit of being more safe sooner.

Yes I agree. Even if imo the civ would be still very vulnerable but definitely a bit better

I like the Portos idea
I would add the following:
Malay
Infantry armor free & Ships fire faster after Thalassocracy
Viets
Reduce the HP to 10% but give them 1PA to archery range units
+1 to Aztecs, Celts, Chines and Incas