I really appreciate the determination behind this rework to water games. Overall, I’m more excited and looking forward to this rework than I am worried about the changes, even though I’ve still been pretty disappointed with the game overall because of Three Kingdoms and The Mountain Royals.
Those I think are positive and most important:
New warship line:
I had suggested introducing a melee ship line to complete the rock-paper-scissors mechanic on water, and now it’s finally come true. This kind of unit is meaningful in itself. I’ve seen some people unhappy about the visual of ships throwing grappling hooks, but personally I’m fine, and I think mods can solve it.
Splitting speed and armor upgrades:
This effectively provides more options for balancing and reasonably reduces the upgrade cost. Aside from the somehow mismatch between the upgrade names and their effects, it’s a very meaningful change too.
Fishing Ships can garrison in Docks:
Thank Buddha. This helps players prevent from falling into an unrecoverable disadvantage too early, which often led them to simply give up on playing water especially on hybrid maps like Nomad or Four Lakes.
Some I think could be better:
The fire range:
Perhaps the Hulk should have a shorter range than Fire Ship, like 2 at most. This would effectively limit the amount of damage Hulks can deal when they group up.
Honestly, I think the fire range is the key to maintaining the rock-paper-scissors balance. In my old suggestion, boarding melee ships should be countered by arrow ships with longer range; arrow ships should be countered by springald ships with even greater range; and springald ships, in turn, should be countered by boarding melee ships with the faster speed and attack bonus. Well, if we apply this idea, there would be Hulk countering Galley, Galley countering Fire Ship, and Fire Ship countering Hulk instead.
The Tech names:
Careening means cleaning the underside of a ship to remove any buildup that would increase its weight and reduce its speed, so it should provide a speed upgrade rather than an armor upgrade. Dry Dock literally sounds more suitable for a precursor to Shipwright rather than something that provides armors. The new techs seem to reference improvements in the structure of hull planks, which feels more like an enhancement to a ship’s durability, and in that sense it might seem more reasonable to provide armor rather than speed.
In my opinion, these could fit more in their effects:
Armor: Carvel Hull → Clinker Construction
Speed: Careening → placeholder
As they’re going to become Unibersity techs, the candidates could be something like Seamanship, Navigation School, or even Cartography.
Trained speed: Dry Dock → Shipwright (split, if people want)
【Edited】 Based on the conclusions discussed in the replies below, they could be:
UU ships or Demo ships:
We know the space in the page is limited, but that still feels no sense. Won’t there any other possible try? Like:
Make those UU ships become the unique upgrade replacing the regular warships or Cannon Galleon?
(Thirisadai also wouldn’t need to take up the ungarrison button slot anymore.)
Move the Elite Cannon Galleon upgrade button to University behind the Siege Engineers, or even directly allow the Siege Engineers to also provide the Elite Cannon Galleon?
Any other else?
【Edited】 Here are some later, more practical ideas:
Feudal Age warships:
I feel that having up to four types of warships is a bit too much for the early water game. Three types should be enough to provide balance and fun. Since the Demo Ship’s upgrade is going to be independent of the others, why not make it accessible only after hitting Castle Age? That way, it stays consistent with the Petard in terms of age. If you age up faster than your opponent, you can consider upgrading your warships or going straight for the Castle Age Demo Ships.
Corresponding civ changes:
I’m not entirely sure if giving the Americans Cannon Galleons was just a temporary measure before introducing new ships in a DLC. It’s hard to imagine how the Americans could reasonably have such long attack range. Just shooting arrows that far?
The new Portuguese UT seems, in some people’s eyes, a bit overpowered. Personally I reserve judgment, since it basically just lets you pay to reveal terrain later in the game, but players will naturally explore most areas anyway as time goes by, so its value decreases over time. Historically, the first to complete a circumnavigation was Spain, so maybe Telescope could be a decent alternative name, echoing the unique ability of the AoE3 Portuguese.
In any case, I believe what we’re seeing now isn’t the whole picture of the rework but possibly just the start. I hope there will be further adjustments in the future, for example, separating ships’ attack and range upgrades from the Fletching line (as well as the Forging line now), so that civs without Bracer or Blast Furnace aren’t inevitably stuck in later games with weaker navies.
Fernão de Magalhães, the captain of the first circumnavigation expedition, was Portuguese.
He tried to get support from the Portuguese crown, but couldn’t get it. Then, he went to the Spanish crown of Castile, and they supported the expedition.
But, halfway through, he died… So, Juan Sebastián Elcano, a Spanish, assumed the captaincy until the end of the expedition.
Nowadays, Fernão de Magalhães expedition is taught in Portuguese and Brazilian schools and could be considered a “hero” (would be interesting to know how it is told in Spain and Spanish speaking countries).
My take is that it is fine to be a feat of a Portuguese civilization, but not of Portugal itself.
Yes. He died at the hands of the Datu of Mactan, Lapulapu. A month later, Tenochtitlan fell.
Yes, the same Elcano who encountered the future Rajah of Maynila, Rajah Matanda, then known as Prince Ache. At the time, Ache was the naval commander for the Sultan of Brunei.
Good review!
About the new Portuguese UT tech, even if the captain of this first circumnavigation is infact Portuguese, I think in this case a more generic name like “ Great Maritime Expeditions” or “Overseas exploration” has better choice.
Personally, I would like a UT with another Effect, maybe something less centered in the “age of discovery” theme, maybe representing the early history of Portugal. I don’t know what can it be, but certainly there are options.
But first, what will be done needs to be defined, assuming that community feedback has some impact on the devs’ decisions. From the options I’ve seen so far here, on Reddit, and on YouTube:
(1) Gameplay before historical flavor → give the mesos the cannon galleon as well, since everyone needs it.
(2) Historical flavor before gameplay → give the mesos an alternative for preemptive attack, one that bypasses their need for cannon galleons.
(3) A compromise between the two: give a Dromon-like ship or reskin the cannon galleon.
Maybe do a poll here and on r/aoe2 to find out which option would be preferred, or at least if there’s a better one?
It’s interesting. I really don’t know whether the achievement should belong to the nationality of the captain or the nationality of the majority of the crew when the expedition fleet consisted of a Portuguese captain leading many Spanish sailors.
Perhaps Knight-villein could be an interesting reference, but from a civ design perspective, featuring gunpowder and naval elements makes it hard not to center them around the Age of Discovery.
For me, at least it is already a good thing for the game to remove a UT that only affects water. If the Portuguese are considered to need some nerf, perhaps the Feitoria could be made inaccessible by default or have its initial efficiency reduced, and then Spice Trade could serve as a UT that unlocks it or increases its efficiency.
Absolutely.
Maybe Canoe could be a trash warship that cost no gold for Native American civs (and maybe some potential African civs), so they could have different advantage in a water game with no siege warships available.
This is indeed more likely to be the devs’ choice. Perhaps they’ll simply take inspiration from AoE3 and let the Native American civs have a canoe or raft that can fire flaming arrows with a range comparable to that of a cannon.
Nice suggestion. I googled it and noticed descriptions of its historical usage by Asians as well, not just Europeans. This broad usage makes it quite reasonable to be included as a regular upgrade.
Also a nice suggestion. The fact that its inventor was Portuguese makes it fitting.
By the way, one of the reasons I personally suggest Telescope is that in AoE3, the Portuguese explorer’s telescope ability is exatcly to reveal unexplored areas (though only partially rather than the whole map).
How about civ not access to seige engineer but elite cannon galleon? Spanish, Italian etc. unit line upgrade available in another building is not ideals. I think demo line upgrade can be merged to warship upgrade instead.
I feel that the Elite Cannon Galleon is actually a pretty highly situational upgrade. Even with no access to Siege Engineers, it might be quite rare for these civs to be able to research Elite Cannon Galleon in practice.
Btw, I’d wish the Spanish get free Elite Cannon Galleon upgrade instead of that odd fast cannonball bonus for their Cannon Galleons, and wish the Italians have Galleass replace the Cannon Galleon line.
Even so, I’m afraid it still wouldn’t be enough to fit both the Demolition Ship and the UU ship on a single page. Also, Thirisadai would still take the slot of ungarrison button.
Honastly, I’d still prefer to have the UU ships replacing the regular warships like how Dragon Ship or Lou Chuan do. If we can have Longboat replacing War Galley, Turtle Ship replacing Fire Ship, Thirisadai and Caravel replacing Cannon Galleon, then the civs can have access to the Demolition Ship line with no problem.
Just saying, if a single tech line can handle almost all the upgrades for regular warships and becomes such an essential tech in water games that players, in practice, actually don’t have the option not to research just when age up, then wouldn’t that be almost no different from simply letting warships upgrades automatically with each age?
It is highly situational doesn’t mean it is useless or can be removed. Even if it is very rarely useful in ranked game it has its own role in casual single play, campaign etc.
At least Thrisidai can be moved to demo ship upgrade position. Koreans/:Portuguese losing one of the ship line, it has place for both UU and UU upgrade. Btw I hope Vikings still losing fire ship and getting Demo.
Even though the upgrade is almost necessary, it still has its own role in balance reason. Imagine Imperial age give free Arbalester, 2HS, Cavalier upgrade, it gives huge powerspike. Then players will invest less on castle age military and more often just rush to go imp. Additional upgrade time and cost makes player who invest more on earlier age military and age up late have more time window to incur damage. I think 4 ships share same upgrade but upgrade cost become more espensive is reasonable direction.
Feel a bit inelegant that the UU ships can not have their button at the same slot since depending on which regular warships those civs missing.
I respect your opinion. I guess this might also be what most people think.
I just personally feel that when we’re about to have a rock-paper-scissors dynamic formed by the Hulk, Fire Ship, and Galley, having their upgrades bundled together feels reasonable. Since the Demolition Ship isn’t part of this triangle, having an independent upgrade line for it also seems acceptable and reasonable to me.
Just a random idea. If we can make the Elite Cannon Galleon upgrade require Heavy Warships upgrade first, and make the Elite UU ship conbined into the Castle Elite UU upgrade, then we can have a table like this:
Col.1
Col.2
Col.3
Col.4
Col.5
Fishing Ship
Transport Ship
Trade Cog
Fishing Lines / Gillnets
Gather Point
Galley line
Fire Ship line
Hulk Line
Demolition Ship line
Ungarrison
UU Ship
Cannon Galleon line
Medium Warships / Heavy Warships / Elite Cannon Galleon upgrade
Demolition Ship line upgrades
Go back to work
Place all the non-combat ships and their upgrades in the first row, and place the basic warships together in the second row.
This is the most elegant solution I can think of at the moment.
My commentary about the Portuguese design is because they already have enough post-medieval\ age of discorvery elements, with a unique colonial building, and a navy with cheaper ships, with faster upgrades, and with more HP, and soon with a UT improving its construction time, a bit too much focus in my opinion.
I think the faster ship creation can be dropped and repurposed for other civilization, and in turn the Portuguese can get another effect.
I agree a pure UT based on water, like others very situational UT , should be reworked into something more useful. If the developers really wants a Ut with some bonus in water-play, then your idea of a second effect unlocking the feitoria or improving its efficiency is better than a map revealer.
I will be a little reticent on nerfing Portuguese directly (outside of the Feitoria) since they are a bit underperforming in some cases, being in a top five of lowest win rate civilizations at moment.
Shipwright means you are improving the “software” of your Dock, crewing it with more skilled personnel.
Careening / Dry Dock means you are improving the “hardware” of your Dock, furnishing it with better facilities that enable you to build & maintain bigger (more Transport capacity) and better ships (more armor & speed).
With that said, I agree that the “hardware” techs have been changed so much over time that their functions no longer align with AOK.
It’d do well to give them both new names and icons.
No. In naval history, the foremost impact of clinker vs. carvel builds is on the ships’ physical performances in water, not durability.
For these two techs, the designer actually intended a simple logic:
= Clinker-built ships have a “ridged” underside that creates more drag in water;
= Carvel-built ships are “smoother” and more hydrodynamically efficient;
= In the Crusades, Northern Europeans came into contact with Mediterranean carvel ship designs, and adopted it back home, replacing traditional northern clinker hulls.
The reality, both of hydrodynamics and naval history, is more complex and nuanced, though the above logic is technically not wrong.
(Also, there’s no way the localizers won’t mistranslate these two terms in dozens of different ways.)
Hulks already had a shorter range than fire ships, at least from what I saw.
Most civs have one or the other. And if they do a good job with the rework, a single ship won’t be dominating everything. But not every civ needs to be a great naval civ, and it’s fine for some civs to have a weaker late game (especially if they have a strong early game)
The tech isn’t that expensive, and it’s quite useful in my own experience. Extra range means you can bombard the shoreline better, which can sometimes justify it on maps where there are small patches of water (like four lakes and Yucatan). And extra bonus damage against buildings is also nice. It’s a pretty good tech if you’ve already won water, and is much easier to afford than shipwright
Having the upgrade gives it an opportunity cost, especially on hybrid maps (where you might opt to ignore water). Giving it for free would also weaken Italian navy (since a lot of their naval strength comes from getting those key upgrades cheaper, making it easier for them to get power spikes).
And there are some ways a player can avoid researching the tech on a water map (example: UU ships or landing on the enemy island). Might not be common, but there are situations where you wouldn’t need the warship upgrades.
Canceling the second page is basically one of the main motivations behind the water rework, so I wouldn’t go as far as to request the opposite.
Besides, I don’t think the devs would change the 5-column by 3-row format just for this reason. The most likely time for such a change was during DE’s development.
I think it’s reasonable or acceptable to require researching Heavy Warships before upgrading to Elite Cannon Galleon, and to have the UU ships and the Castle UUs share a single elite upgrade tech in the Castle. So even if the Demolition Ship upgrades aren’t bundled together with the other warships, the Dock would still free up two slots and have enough space.
Thanks for the clarification. I know little about shipbuilding, searching for keywords but not necessarily understand the informaiton. It’s just that their icons really look like they’re meant for ship armor. I believe 99% of players don’t understand shipbuilding terms either.
Since these terms also relate to sailing speed, we don’t need Careening to affect ship speed. But still it isn’t suitable for armor anyway. So, perhaps:
Speed: Carvel Hull → Clinker Construction
(Now we’ve learned they do reflect the improvements for ships’ physical performances in water.)
Armor: Double Planking → Watertight Compartments
(I believe this time these two are indeed for durability.)
If Shipwright can be split, the build speed upgrades could be Careening → Dry Dock, while the wood discount could remain with Shipwright.
I’ve watched Ornlu’s video, and noticed that grappling hooks sometimes look long, like to extend more than 2 tiles.
Maybe it’s because the unit is moving, now I guess.
If the grappling hook’s range is indeed this short, maybe what should be nerfed is the rate of fire, or perhaps they could increase the attack delay so that the first hit occurs later, limiting micro.