From the screenshot they appear to have the same ‘explosion’ graphic on the towers as a non-chemistry trebuchet.
I kind of feel like they will either be a shorter range/mobile replacement for the treb or something similar to the bombard cannon.
Just my guess
Nice observation. Also they seem to have 7-8 tiles of range. So maybe a mangonel+trebuchet hybrid.
I noticed some new “Market stale” assets with asian style on the screenshot with Green vs Red too. That’s pretty cool to see more eye candies coming for map makers.
It still only contains copies of V&V.
Sadly, yes, it hasn’t changed.
So here is what I noticed as “new things for map makers”, I’ve not included what everyone already noticed such as castle, new units.
On the Red vs Green
On the Red vs Yellow:
Those bridges sections are from the very same brdige type visible on the same screenshot, the broken beige brdige. I’m not sure if the border is the actual avaiable one or if it’s a new one with beiger color but I think it’s the current one in the client so I’ve not highlighted it.
The bird I’ve notcied on this one is already in the client so nothing new.
Except that, all things seen here, fish, bushes, etc, seems to be already ingame.
For the chinese expertes out there, it seems we’ve identified the four new groups of “chinese” according to flags / units / castle details, so what do you think wonders for them could be ? What famous things exist linked to each of them that could become Wonders, cause it seems we’re having at least 2, at most 3, new wonders and eventually two other new castle sprites.
One other question came to me, for the arrow-rocket-cart. How will it move ? I see no animal, no operator, and only two wheels. How will it deal with earth gravity in motion is intriguing me a lot. For examples, others sieges tend to have either an operator pushing them, or four wheels for the motion. Trebuchet is the exception cause it got the transform mechanics, maybe it will have too, but even so I can’t figure out how it will “walk”. Anyone know how AoE4 handles that ? I’m too lazy to search myself hahaha.
I wonder too if there will be a regional “hand canonner” for asian civs, that would be pretty cool, something generic enought to be used on all the asian civs. As in a “Steppe Lancer” equivalent, not just a reskin, but a real replacement of it with let’s say less armor, or what so ever, infact I don’t know well enought gunpowder specificity for asian area to know what it could be made of.
That’s a lot of work and a very good eye there!
I spotted a few of those, but one very pretty element I missed was those markets. What a quaint little addition!
With the weapon racks, you can also see some in yellow’s base as well, and there is a bit more colour contrast and you can make out the weapon heads better. Some are clearly Chinese weapons (I see a Guan-do) but others look fairly generic.
The red tree is 100% new. I do a lot of scenario editor stuff and I have never seen it before.
The bridge I think was added in Mountain Royals.
Definitely new, and there are a couple of others: one with yellow leaves in the bottom right of the same screenshot, one with orange leaves near the yurts, and another with orange leaves by the castle in the snowy screenshot.
I wonder if the leaves underneath are a separate object or part of the tree sprite. There are similar (but less bright) under some other trees in that screenshot too.
I think it’s a new grass texture as well.
The rack on the yellow base are not new, they are from the tent directly, and they served as base for the rack they did in RoR and Chronicles. But the one from yellows are not new. It’s the military tent, mainly the big tent. (which were released with african kingdom if I’m right, so more arabic style, you can see some ancient egyptian sword style)
The bridge is already there, but not the “brdige part”, we have one in game, but it’s not this one, or it’s hidden in editor maybe ?
The Japanese building set doesn’t work for Chinese related civilisations like this. Why is there bamboo in a desert??
While I agree the buildings are far too overtly Japanese. The bamboo isn’t really an issue.
Not really appropriate for the Jurchens or Tanguts, but for the Chinese and Vietnamese, it’s fine.
Also side thoughts:
With the Jurchens being added, and new historical campaigns. There’s a chance of more Korean ones now, as we have a better opponent for them. As the Koreans and Jurchens fought many battles against each other.
Secondly. While new scenario editor details are always included, this does seem to be a pretty high amount, and we have never gotten new floor textures before (we did get new trees in Dawn of the Dukes). Although I am not sure if the swamp details came with that DLC as well. I tried to check but couldn’t find anything concrete. So it does look like this is a pretty big DLC.
Although we have fewer chances to get Japanese campaigns
But Koreans undoubtedly have the opportunity to appear in campaigns with these civilizations.
Depends on time.
Chinese building started to diverse from its classical style from late Tang, and Japanese building started to diverse from Chinese building since Heian era.
In about 1200s, they became mostly different from each other, and it’s the time when gengis campaign begins.
What would be the new campaigns for the new civilizations?
I just compared it to the Mountain Royals bridge, the edging is different (Mountain Royals one is VERY similar, but the stone wall is taller). So yeah, it’s new after all.
Ah! I got confused, thought they were the pavilions, but they are actually the South East Asian army tents. Which do have those weapons on them. Not sure why they have what is clearly a kopesh by them though.
Might be Agoda (founder of Jurchen Jin dynasty) for Jurchen.
For Chinese (if they really do a campaign for them), I think might be Yue Fei or An Lushan rebellion.
Tangut… not sure… might be their war againts Song dynasty in X century?
Now you just raised my impatience. 11
Thanks a lot for such detailed observations.
Cause the asset were shared for both AoE2 and AoE1 when they were made. Sparing monney by using things that can depict items in both games by doing the job once is a pretty solid way to invest monney elsewhere in the dev process, and I totally agree with this method.
Remember this game is not about realism but about story telling, nothing can be perfect, goal is for our imagination to still be part of the game process so we can “be part of it”.
I prefer reused assets and a stable game rather than realism with a broken game.
But if you’re curious, you can find more eye candies on the RoR editor sprites, and if you pay attention you can even recognize that some items available since chronicles, like the wooden gaia walls, are part from old things…For instance, those wooden walls are from the feudal african architecture set, you can see it on the archery range.
The game is full of very nice assets that can be used in different purpose, I’m impatient to see all new goodies with the next DLC.
Always thought a Wu Zetian campaign for Chinese would be neat. An intriguing story of her being the power behind the throne before she became Empress, and a lot of different enemies to battle (although one of whom would be Tibet ideally). However, I wonder if they will prioritize campaigns in the gunpowder era now that they’re introducing all these new gunpowder units (maybe not if we already know there’s a scenario in the 4th century), or just grant access to gunpowder units regardless of the era the campaign is set in (something I thought they avoided doing in the last several DLCs).
