Hello there, first of all, this is just for fun, i really don’'t expect huge changes in the game.
The idea is to give each civ a negative bonus to create some new weakness or reinforce some playstyle, just to give a little more diversity to the civs.
Posible examples:
Huns monks cost 100% more gold (since thay have atheism in game)
Japanese receive 15% more damage from gunpowder units
Britons cavs recieve 20% more bonus damage from spears
This would ruin the game. I don’t think it’s a very good idea. This sort of thing could have crazy affects on balance. Missing blacksmith techs and tech in general for some civs is enough.
As I remember there is just four negative bonus: Khmer farms don’t require drop points but works %5 less, Huns don’t need houses but -100 wood, Chinese has 3 more villagers but -200 food, -50 wood, Mayans has 1 more villager but -50 food.
I love feeling of free bonuses or paid bonuses. “But” makes me think it’s worth.
I don’t like randomly you don’t have this. Why I don’t have that? Hand Cannons already good against my infantry when I am playing as Japanese so there is historical accuracy too. Why I take a lot of damage? My British stable is too bad already why I take more damage in addition of mediocre stable? Why Hunnic Monks costs more? Roman sources wrote they are atheist (Huns whatever they did Romans hate that much) but they are most likely believing a nomadic religion. Why my Knights doesn’t loyal when I am playing as Lithuanians? I am good leader and I am paying them good enough and upgrading them.
I don’t mind maluses for civs, as long as they are eco-related and not military maluses.
Military units already have a rock-paper-cisors relationship, so i don’t see the need to increase their weaknesses. That would either :
A/ turn a civ’s strong point into a high risk play due to many exploitable weaknesses
B/ make a civ’s weak point even more useless, which is pointless
C/ increase the disparity between civs that can field the right counter and those who don’t.
I could have been an useful tool for balance if a single negative bonus for each civ was implemented from the beggining, when the game came out. It could have been possible to design civs in a way that if they ended up too strong in a specific aspect you could use the negative bonus to balance it.
Now it would be a pain to balance if we start modifing every civ, and many players would be upset to find the civs they’ve played for so many years affected in negative ways.
However, I think that negative bonus could soften the game-breaking effects that innovative mechanics belonging to the (possible) incoming civs will have on the game.
I don’t think of those as a negative bonus, they are just trade off of the starting position of those civs. You get more vills and a TC with a higher pop capacities from the start but you pay for those resources anyway,
Well they are no random, they fit the civ some way or another… no needing to carry the food to a mil is more random that what I proposed btw (not that I’m complaining of a unique balanced mechanic).
-I don’t care if real life huns were atheist or not, but they have a unit tech that reduce enemy relic gold, so is not a bad idea (IMO) to make them harder to get relics anyway by more expensive monks… (i don’t care about the %, this is just for fun)
-Lithuanians was the target of many crusades on northern europe, and they abandon paganism, so weakness to conversion has some logic
Again, this is not random and I could continue, but this is not about the details of a negative bonus that we won’t see, is just to have some fun and imagine some different way to add more diversity to the civs
This is historical. This game just for fun, not completely for historical accuracy. I don’t think scouts easily being converted isn’t good for balance.
Japanese lost a lot of samurais to gunpowder. Historical accuracy but why you want this on a RTS game?
By randomly I meant why would you add this to Age of Empires 2?
I love playing as both Mongols and Magyars. I don’t want to pick one of them because other has negative bonus which I don’t know the reason it exists.
Look at other games, they don’t care historical accuracy (RTS) or making sense (RTS) or negative bonus can be removed lately (Grand Strategy).
Age of Empires 2 has good balance. By adding a lot of negative bonuses game balance will be changes a lot.
Yes, I didn’t mentioned it because the bonus tells less wood bonus at villager bonus (I forgot Mayan resources last %15 longer but Mayans farms slower but I can be wrong). I see those as a unique technology in Dark Age. It tells what you pay for and there is just one possiblity. That’s why I hate Age of Empires 3. You have shipment cards, advancing age bonuses… Too many possibilities. You feel bad when you didn’t used/added an age bonus/a card(shipment).
I don’t Care 100% acuracy, but some historical flavor can be good.
To some degree everyone can agree they do like that.
There is a reason why Franks are a cav civ and britons an archer one and i doubt ppl would liked them the other way around
As long is balanced, is not complicated and Suits the civ there is nothing wrong.
Briton Stable and Frank Archery Range is a meme. You can clearly see this by looking at the tech tree. Just Franks can use Skirms and Britons can use Knights at situational usage (very situational, don’t remove their usage too).
Lacking Bloodlines, Hussars, Paladin, Camels means you don’t need to waste 175 wood on a Stable. Lacking Arbalesters, Thumb Ring and Blacksmith techs means you don’t need to waste 175 wood on an Archery Range.
I know they are Bad, but they are good un their respective roles because medieval France was famous for their knights and England for their archers. Even though french had very good xbows and English have a fearsome cav, the bonuses they choosed kind of fit their history.
If You have to choose a bonus for a civ, either a positive ir negativo one, they should fit the civ history
Yes, they should but they don’t have to. Like I don’t think Khmer has Scorpion army nor Turtle Ships created more than 40. Indians didn’t had just a fat archer on top of an elephant. Relics generates gold out of nothing and a bold man can convert units and buildings.
I don’t think negative bonuses good idea except some OP bonus from start “but” closed with resource loss.
I know nothing about khmers army, but all You said is kind of historical, but not totally accurate because of gameplay or simple errors. Indians used elephants as a plataform for archers, monks (priest or imans) were an important parte in converting entire cities.
Devs don’t randomly give bonus to a X civ, i’m not saying that historical data is more important than balance or gameplay, but they do their homework before creating q civ
Scorpion on a Elephant doesn’t makes sense but balanced (with cost) and funny. I don’t know too but I don’t expect anything like that. But I am sure their farmers weren’t teleporting resources.
Some bonuses are random(ish) some are historical. Saracen Market is historical, Saracen team bonus randomly. They had good archers but archers never good against buildings except fire arrows and they aren’t usually worth. Using Siege equipments better.
Yes, they are doing research to find good bonuses. Like Teutonic Armour, Magyar Recurve Bow. Researches give idea. But you must use your imagination too.
im all for it for new civs, but at the moment civ weakness is defined by lack of access to certain things like no cav for mesos or no bbc/redemption for chinese, persians have nothing beyond LS.
also people are just generally happier having bonuses over negatives. like reducing a frank bonus will upset fewer people than giving them a negative bonus
I like the idea, but feel like it could make things more confusing for new players as well. We have 37 factions and counting, further differentiation (especially in a negative sense) adds a higher barrier of entry.