Only 2 unique units per civ?

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
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I can safely admit that, imo, it wasn’t necessarily the variety of units that made each Civilization feel unique… but more so the general play-style of each Civilization.

Considering the information we’re given from the Civilization descriptions on the main website, there’s more at play than just, “Well, the Mongols have Cavalry Archers.” It’s kind of one-sided to exclude the addition of unique buildings, upgrades/buffs, differences in economical focus, and the potential landmark bonuses that each civ has access to, in whether or not any one civilization can be considered asymmetrical to another.

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If a wide variety of unique units is the only qualifying factor for what makes a Civilization feel unique, then that’s on you. AoE4 might not be your game. :man_shrugging:

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(post deleted by author)

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Sounds like your experience was different from mine. :stuck_out_tongue: You’re entitled to that, lol.

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I play AoE3 so asymmetry for me is different from what asymmetry is for you, I guess.

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The AoE4 vs AoE3 debate has been pretty thoroughly rammed into all of us on these forums, idk how many times. I come from AoE3, and I’ll honestly admit that AoE3 is the most mechanically fluid AoE game to date. It’s fun, and the play style variety is insanely wide.

But I would also argue that AoE3 is the most difficult AoE game to pick up. It’s a lot to take in, dude. There’s so much going on in AoE3 and it’s so fast paced compared to any other AoE game… and it could probably be argued that, that’s probably why it’s never consistently had the same population interest that AoE2 has. But idk, man. Maybe it was something else. :man_shrugging:

edit: AoE3 has also had like 15+ years worth of updates. Idk if that matters.

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Only 2 revealed for each civ, there are more that are in videos but not on the website.

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While all unique cavalry are simply reskinned hussars?

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You guys can sit around boohoo all day that Magudai and Horse Archers aren’t different because “it just man on horse with bow :clown_face:” But if I say that unique cav are just reskinned Hussars because "it just man on horse with sword :clown_face: ", it’s not okay?

Got it. Move on, my guy.

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Before “you-guys”-ing, there is a magical button on this forumn called “quote” and you may quote where I said anything like that.
BTW, ARE THOSE CAVALRY RESKINNED HUSSARS?

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Woops

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When they release a video that is less than 2 minutes long that can fully describe two entire civs and two campaigns, it is difficult to conclude there’s very much design put into the civs.

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while the ranged cavalry can be unique from 1 another, the description we got of them so far seem to be generic inherent advantages of said units.

“good against melee infantry” or “good at hit and run” are inherent advantages of ranged cavalry, it doesn’t take a description to know that and i expect all ranged cavalry units to be good at that regardless of their stats. like unless you give them an insane aiming time or a ■■■■■■ multiplier vs melee infantry then they are always going to be good at those things, this isn’t news and it doesn’t describe any differences.

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I could describe an aoe2 civ’s bonuses in less than 10 seconds. Doesn’t mean the implications of those bonuses isn’t interesting and unique.

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honestly? yes, yes it does. aoe 2 faction are extremely uninspired, not to mention all factions have access to the same units with the same skins.

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I agree with your post. It was very well written but man you can tell that it is also very biased and misleading indeed.

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Unfortunately it seems the main asymmetrical aspect of the game is in the civs civ bonuses and faction mechanic and not so much the units.

I doubt this will change my release.

I think it’s a matter of wanting not to displease the Age of Empires 2 fans who aren’t big on asymmetry.

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Here is how I see this:

First of all, when discussing unique units as in soldiers, siege weapons , etc. in a historic RTS game that is based on Medieval timeline then we have to take the timeline into consideration or it just won’t fit into the narrative which they have created this game upon. What do I mean by this?

I’ve seen a few common demands that each civilization should rather have close to 20+ unique units and we are not just talking about different skins, stats but also providing each unique unit with a specialty being a clickable ability or a passive ability that grants for example bonus stats vs another unique unit etc. and to this I say this:

No only is it close to impossible to balance that amount of units out, but can you show proof that there were indeed this many unique types of soldiers/sieges for EVERY different empire throughout the Medieval Ages that was used for a unique reason? Again I’m not talking about having three different swordsmen and only change the stats on them and their skins for each civilization that to me is still a swordsman and not classified as a unique unit in my book.

The fact of the matter is that most Empires at this time for example Western Empires used a lot of the same type of units but what made them different is the way they were doing things, different tactics used in battle, some specialized in a specific unit more than others, etc. Now, where am I’m going with this?

What I think Relic has done here is simply logical and reasonable in my eyes. They have taken 8 different civilizations and have made them play out differently from each other, not so much by having many unique units but rather having different traits, mechanics and overall play out differently from each other how you approach things in the open world, and that to me is what makes each civilization unique enough to stand out from each other and make it fun at the same time.

We can use references to AoM or SCII or any other RTS game but those two games happen also to be fantasy-driven, and thus creating more unique units is more of an easy task as you can use more different units that aren’t based on true historic background.

Again, without going into much detail on how each civilization works in AoEIV due to NDA the important things that we need to have into consideration is things like different traits, mechanics, and game-play styles that forces you to play differently depending on which civilization you play as and also the terrain advantages/disadvantages and also vs which other civilizations your enemy players are playing as and into which direction they choose to go with their landmarks.

Could they have added a few more unique units to each civilization? Possibly some civilizations more than others but overall what makes them stand out from each other is how they play and not the number of unique units you can create as that doesn’t necessarily create asymmetric civilizations in my mind.

They’ve told us many times that they have many plans for the future of this game, so time will tell how they choose to handle that, perhaps we haven’t seen the end of new changes/additions to the main 8 civilizations but also introducing new one as well. I wish them the best of luck.

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Unique units have to have unique clickable abilities to be considered unique? On which franchise are you exactly commenting on? Because it can’t be this one.

I could also argue that unique civs have little to do with historical accuracy, especially in a time as the middle ages where we have a huge variety of weapons, customs and cultural nuances even among geographically close people. It’s not up to history, it’s up to the creator’s creativity and imagination to make unique units to stand out and take some liberties in their design where necessary. Different stances, attack animations and effects, names and weapons on top of stats and visuals are some of the ways to create unique units.
I don’t know what your book tells you but the Hypaspist and the Myrmidon in AoM for instance are two different and unique units despite that they both carry swords.

And balance is something that devs should be the ones to be concerned of. I am not going to keep the bar as low as possible out of an irrational fear that devs may not be able to balance out 8 asymmetric civs.

Also, I really don’t understand why some of you keep on thinking that AoEIV will become significantly richer as time goes on. Is it just wishful thinking? I’m doing a lot of wishful thinking myself but I realize how grim and dry things look right now.
AoEIII managed to improve the experience greatly with its expansions but not only did it start out as more asymmetric than AoEIV but also offered an unbelievable variety and richness that is nowhere to be found here. The base game itself heralded its beautiful expansions.

If the comparison that I did above was biased then it was actually biased in favor of AoEIV as I decided to exclude a ton civilian and other unique miscellaneous AoEIII units and only considered the military ones that can be trained through your military buildings. The same exact principle was applied to AoEIV.

That was made clear in the post but some of you all too conveniently decided to shrug it off and carry on with calling the comparison biased without any reasonable argument to support this claim.

Let’s add every other unit in AoEIII vanilla, then you can also add the 1-2 extra scholars and the mongol Khan of AoEIV or any other unit that you believe I did not treat fairly. Then do the math and please come back and enlighten me which game is richer and has more unit variety and better designed civs.

Mercenaries (Not Every Civ can create all them. They are distributed across them):

Finish Hackapells
Black Riders
Landsknechts
Swiss Pikemen
Jaegers
Egyptian Mamelukes
Barbary Corsairs
Ronin Samurais
Privateers
Highlander
Manchurian Cavalry Archers
Balkan Stradiots

Vills:

Settler Wagons
Coureurs des Bois
Settlers (common)

Healers:
Surgeons
Priest
Imam
Missionary

Scouts:
Hot Air Balloons
Explorer
Envoy
Paiute Scout
Dog

Trainable animals:
-Cows
-Sheep
-Lamas

Let’s add to all of that the units that you can train from 12 different native settlements in AoEIII.

AoEIII (Vanilla) Native Settlement units:

Aztec Eagle Warrior
Aztec Jaguar Warrior
Carib Blowgunner
Carib Ambusher
Cherokee Rifleman
Comanche Horse Archer
Cree Tracker
Incan Huaminca
Incan Bolas Warrior
Iroquois Tomahawk
Iroquois Mantlet
Lakota Axe Rider
Lakota Dog Soldier
Maya Holcan Spearman
Medicine Man
Nootka Clubman
Nootka War Chief
Seminole Sharktooth Bowman
Tupi Blackwood Archer
Buttercup the Pet Cougar

You guys are in serious denial if you still believe that AoEIV units are better or richer than that or its civs more asymmetric. To me, it goes without saying which game offers a more complete and rich experience here.

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199

Mangudai might be the only horse archers capable of shooting while moving. Sorta like Parthian tactics.

Besides that, skins, and stats there really isn’t much you can do to make horse archers completely different. They have a specific role and description and unit type.

Unless you go to the realm of fantasy these two units are only going to differ slightly.

Its a matter of opinion not fact. A lot of units in aoe3 aren’t in actuality that “unique” they are just differently named units with different skins and stats. Aoe IV seems to also have different units with skins and stats, except some of them lack a unique name. Just having a unique name really doesn’t contribute much to the experience IMO. Most units seem to just be a variation of “Heavy infantry”, “light infantry” etc. How is that different from Aoe IV? Aoe 3 doesn’t just break its unit categories by naming them differently, that’s entirely superficial. Unless you’d prefer fluff like “mongol swordsman”, “Abbasid archer” etc.The units will probably already vary in tech and stats and skins. They don’t even have unique skills like in Aoe IV. French cav seem to have a castable ability that can increase charge dmg and speed, the Khan has been seen to cast different buffs on his units, and Longbowmen can deploy spikes on the ground.

Also it is premature to judge the game as less rich and fun when it isn’t even out yet. Most people haven’t even experienced the game yet.

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Obviously it is not just a name issue.
The Missionaries for example are a variation of priests that not only heals but gives an attack bonus in an area of effect and also stacks with other missionaries. On top of that it’s a completely different model than the other priests, it’s a guy on a donkey. How is that not unique? Most of AoEIII models are really inspired and the ‘feeling’ of uniqueness is just as if not more important than actual uniqueness. I don’t get than feeling with AoEIV units.
Some explorers have the ability to reveal a location on the map. There’s a clickable ability. Ships also have clickable abilities that make them fire repeatedly for a period of time. Scouts can become invisible. Cuirassers and many mercenaries have area of effect damage. Settler wagons are stronger vills that gather faster and can be trained from mills, their numbers are limited. AoEIII has all of that and more. And definitely adds more categories than the simplistic rock-paper-scissor model. Native settlement units like the Jaguar warrior, the Mantlet or Tomahawk are completely different.

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