well that is a lot of ottomans.
simple and quick changes that help out alot:
foundry cost reduced from 250 to 200
abus gun cost increased to 160 gold 40 food from 100 gold 50 food.
damage reduced to 25, x3 vs infantry(4 with rifling), x2 vs light cavalry. 18 range, + 2 per rank. 3.0 rof, 2 min range.
hp reduced to 120, range resist increased to 50%
jan cost reverted to 100 food 25 gold, melee resist increased to 30%, melee attack to 18 x 2.5 vs cav.
artillery cards replaced with ottoman artillery hitpoints, attack, and combat (bombards, falconets, abus and grenadiers)
cav team hitpoints and cav attack card added.
somali, sudanese, berber, sufi native cards added
jan cost card also reduces train time, battlefield construction moved to age 4 and increases jan combat.
silk road now part of ottoman royal decree.
the abus changes are insane
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eh not so sure i agree 24 ranged abus guns are a good idea.
50% ranged resist would litterally mean they will trade well vs any ranged infantry unit, a thing they already do well due to their siege damage.
it is 40% more expensive villager second wise compared to before.
50% ranged resist means they still have 103 less ranged hp compared to 2 skirmishers despite costing similarly in v.s., a 43% increase for the skirmishers.
120 hp means they die 25% faster to hussars, 4 hits instead of 5. that’s 20% less time needed for hussars and steppe riders to stay on them to kill them, and a 50% decrease in hp per pop compared to skirmishers. skirms have double the raw hp per pop. leather cannons now one shot them, lancers 2 shot them instead of 3. that hp lost has very real impact, not even considering the sizable cost increase at the same time.
24 range is only in imperial, they are still shorter ranged, have 42% of the ranged hp, and lack aoe compared to falconets vs infantry in imperial. without that range there is little incentive to using 5 abus vs 2 falconets.
currently abus deals 7 more damage to bowriders before dying compared to a single skirmisher, dropping them to 105 hp instead of 112. meanwhile 2 skirmishers will kill a bow rider without losing a unit instead, with over half their hp left
this way they beat the bow rider with roughly 20 hp left, or 17% of their hp instead of 50%+ for skirmishers, more than the full hp of the abus.
aside from testing and theory crafting, none of this really has much basis till detailed civ win rates, match history and other data are public again. it’s been 2 years, what’s the eta on having the information available?
aoe4 released 2 years later and the information was public at launch along with seeing friends online. game has had it for decades, it’s reasonable to expect it to be available by now?
remember that they are also available in age 2, so your change of 25 x3 as base means they deal more damage then they do now and 2 abus one shots muskets. in addition the 120 hp with 50 range resist means that it takes 11 musket shots and 15 crossbow shot to kill a single abus.
They also outrange all infantry in age 2, so a proper jan abus comp would basically be untouchable in age 2
For comparison, the cannoneer merc which is abus variant doesn’t even have those stats, and they are considered better then normal abus
they already 2 shot muskets with rifling, that’s 100 damage a shot to heavy infantry, the same amount of damage they would deal with these changes. if you think that is op, then it is already in game. there is no difference in damage with rifling against heavy infantry.
with the changes they would be 2 shotting base muskets without rifling, but they also cost 40% more resources as well while being more vulnerable to cavalry.
2 skirmishers can tank 15 musket shots and 22 crossbow shots, nearly 50% more shots.
put another way, 2 musketeers can tank 14 musketeer shots and the same amount of crossbow shots.
their ranged hp per pop is below that of most infantry in the game per pop.
many infantry are not outranged, such as longbows, Yumi, and skirmishers. and at 2 pop per unit with massively less hp per pop, ranged or otherwise, they are very fragile.
the cannoneer has more raw hp, more damage, and costs half the population space. they literally have 2.25x more damage per pop and 2.2x more hp per pop. they have 325 ranged hp per 2 pop compared to the abus 240, 35% more ranged hp.
if we are comparing abus to cannoneers, the abus would need even more of a buff. its not even close.
yeah and you are effectively giving them rifling and then some for free in age 2, which is beyond insane.
for comparison, age 2 skirms deal 30 damage per shot to muskets, meaning that 4 skirms still cannot kill a single musket. the only civ that even get age 2 skirm is dutch and they don’t even get musket to counter cav.
Otto can go jan abus and just chase cav away
so in age 2, that is basically 3 civs that can sort of fight them out of 20 in the entire game, yumi won’t even outrange them. It will force all other civs to fight them in age 3, where otto can pressure and follow up and get access to spahi and mamlukes.
Cannoneers are mercs so they are supposed to be better, but my point was that even the cannoneer with its stat distribution doesnt have the multipliers you are proposing.
rifling and then some? damage per shot would be the same with rifling.
age 2 skirms have vastly more hp and more range. they also build out of a barracks with pikemen instead of requiring a separate building and a vastly better eco behind it. that’s a 240 hp difference, 206 when considering ranged hp in 4 skirms vs 2 abus. range advantage as well and skirms just as easily fight muskets.
they already have 50% of the hp of skirmishers, in exchange for dealing 25% more damage. take that damage advantage and you have a unit that has half the hitpoints to deal the exact same damage at less range?
a 40% increase in abus cost paired with otto eco means any death ball will be quite slow to build and give plenty of time to breath. and with jan cost increased as well, otto will be vulnerable to bullying early game and your timings will hit alot slower. how exactly are you going to guard a batch of 5 abus that are weaker against cav and will die to them far faster than jans will kill cav? early game you have no mass.
you don’t need to outrange, with significant mass advantage that only grows over time you bait more expensive jans to front with cav then shoot them with your own ranged infantry. you are more mobile, have greater eco, and vastly more hp per pop. lack of siege damage and significantly slower mass means they can’t stop an ff with new abus, not even close.
cannoneers are better than abus. I don’t understand the comparison.
Are Cannoneers actually any better than Abus Guns?
They fire a bit faster, but their damage output is still considerably lower. Maybe the lower overkill makes it more efficient.
They are lower population but it’s a bit harder to mass them as effectively when they can only be created out of Taverns.
currently the stat is 40 x1.5 = 60, meaning it requires 3 shot to kill a musket
when you get CIR, then its 40x2.5 =100 so a 2 shot (most of the time you can only get this in age 3 but that is another matter)
under ur proposal, it will be 25 x 3 = 75, meaning musket are 2 shot
it is literally giving the value of CIR to abus for free in age 2
not to mention it scales more due to it being a higher multiplier, hence the and then some.
with the atk card, the current stat works out to 69 dmg per shot
under your proposal, it would be 86.25, meaning it still 2 shots british musk with upgrade cards, it even 2 shot ashi. the only musk they can’t just 2 shot are sepoy and jan and the bolas and even then they are close.
Only a number of civs actually have the characteristics to pull this off, in addition, you can’t really bait jan cause they dont need to actually melee the cav, they can just fire at the cav, you have to melee the jans themselves in which case you have to commit to the fight and in age 2 what civ is actually sure that its able to mass up that fast to take decisive fight against otto.
And that is even before taking into account your proposal, where jans are tankier in melee and kills cav more quickly
remember otto can have early age up time and is known for taking tps for eco.
edit: in addition not a lot of civ are more mobile in age 2, most infantry have 4 speed and its not like otto cant add cav themselves.
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by lategame that practically does not matter. its still a fairly cheap unit.
skirmisher do ranged damage and have ranged resist, making them completely unable to compete with a unit that ignores their armor while also having effectively double hp and 4 more range. this is an insane advantage, pop disadvantage or not.
these are pretty specific scenarios.
do you compare skirmishers in imperial age to falcons? or longbows? skirmishers have other advantages like massability compared to true art.
so? they trade dmg vs artillery and some infantry for anti cavalry ability, you have janissary anyways which can do the job just fine. in fact with janissaries you shouldnt even really be trading hp that much vs a dragoon.
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also im against improving anti cavalry on janissary, its 1 of the trade offs the unit get for a high hp and high base melee attack.
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again, it is a 40% more expensive unit. the number of shots needed is reduced to 33%. the scaling by multiplier argument makes no sense, there is no difference. 40 * 1.2 * 2.5 is the exact same as 25 * 1.2 * 4, 120 damage dealt. 40 * 2 * 2.5 is again the same as 25 * 2 * 4, 200 damage. damage vs heavy infantry will always be the same regardless of how much you upgrade them.
jan deal 16 ranged damage to hussars, let’s say 32 for 2 jans. it takes 20 shots for jans to kill a hussar, 2 skirmishers will deal 60 damage to jans and kills them in 7 shots. that is a 3 times difference.
even if you add in abus damage to hussars, skirms hussar will always have vastly more survivability and snipe free jans if microed correctly, while snaring and dealing free damage if the jans don’t turn around.
jans are slower than hussars, can’t tank nearly the same amount of ranged damage, and can’t bait or snare like cav. jans being tanker in melee won’t change that, they will still take 30 skirmisher damage while dealing 16 ranged damage to hussars.
tp require you to protect them to be effective, with smaller early game army that is infantry based you will have harder time protecting multiple locations.
a 40% increase always matters, whether early or late game. your now making 7 units instead of 10 for the same price. that influences your massability and sustainability, whether playing supremacy or treaty.
4 more range means you are talking about imperial, at which point pop advantage is the most important. 2 skirms have massively more hp than abus, whether talking about raw hp or ranged.
hussars are in 8 civs, steppe rider another, leather cannons and lancers mean 10 civs. that is over half the roster, how is that niche? you can add in sowars, naginatas, coyotes, chimu and shotels as units that would kill abus significantly faster. that is 15, 75% of the roster.
compare them too either. skirmishers have far more hit points per pop, surviving 100% more damage against non-ranged damage and 43% more against ranged damage. falconets have longer range and aoe and one shot most infantry.
light cavalry will tank ranged damage just fine from abus/jan while easily killing of abus and artillery, meanwhile skirms will kill jans far faster. you can’t outrun light cavalry; you deal very little damage to them and you can’t deal with them at any range higher than 12 currently.
sepoys have the exact same melee attack as jans, but with a 3x bonus to cav instead of 2. they also have 20% higher hp than muskets, and 25% more ranged damage than janissaries in exchange for 14% less hp. not much of a tradeoff for the sepoy.
jans already cost more than muskets yet deal less damage and come from a single unit building, have no infantry train card and a single combat card. that’s plenty of tradeoff for jans already.
I seriously think that Ottos need some buff for their late game. It considers both abus and janissary. Especially, Abus.
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I think so too, abus perform poorly for pop space and jans get out scaled easily.
honestly, it’s just a quick suggestion I came up with in a few minutes, there’s no need to argue about it. I barely play the game these days and I’ve given up on ladder long ago due to the game’s buggy launch and missing features.
any changes should be informed by data and encourage fun interactive gameplay and run through balance playtesting. we are still missing public civ win rate information so aside from subjective experiences we are just guessing in the dark.
Jan abus age 2 is still a very potent comp due to xbows being ■■■■ against jans in age 2, if we want to buff the units, best it not be a base stat change, make it some kind of late game change.
Like how lbs get extra multi with imp upgrade, strelet get extra range, same with abus and gurkha
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No matter what the breakdown of any individual unit is the dreaded Saphis, Jan falconet combo from a Ottoman ff is the strongest earliest in the game.
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