Please do not implement auto scouting

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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Please do not implement auto scouting.

You are not doing new players or the game any favors through this option.

The way to increase engagement is not through streamlining and destroying the nuances of the game.

You do new players no favors by giving them a crutch and teaching them inadvertently that scouting isn’t that important don’t worry about it the game will scout for you.

A way to think about this is as though it is schooling.

When a child is struggling in math the solution is not to give them the answer to every test and question they face. It is to take the time to TEACH them how to do it properly.

This is the exact same thing. When you start aoe it can be overwhelming. There is so much going on so many new things and a million new maps to play non of them ever the same.

However the beauty of match making is that your opponent is equally overwhelmed. That is how you make friends and have fun.

Each step of the way you improve bit by bit, and the people you play also improve bit by bit. Reflecting this improvements is a number that goes near your name.

Auto scouting will not help new players it will reinforce bad habits creating a shaky foundation.

When that new player hits a level where the auto scouting is not longer effective, imagine their frustration. every game they have played this has been used now it lets them down. and they have no idea how to adjust. Why because they never had to scout before.

So now they have to back track and relearn this whole new skillset because to advance this artificial solution will no longer be effective.

They never had to learn one of the most foundational and important skillsets in all of RTS. Until it was far to late in their development.

I am pleading with you guys. Please do not do this.

Never mind the inevitable coding issues they will make this feature broken as all ■■■■.

But seriously think on how much you are cheating your new player base. The answer is not to give them a subpar crutch to lean upon.

But to give them the tools in which to learn properly and excel within their environment.

I would never cheat my children.

Please, don’t cheat your community.

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Hey StatingComet, welcome to the forums!

So, I have to say that I strongly disagree with you. The auto exploration seems to be a cool addition to the game, and if fact many moderner RTS games have this as a feature on the units behave.

I see it more as giving the kid a calculator. The tool will automate some processes, but the the need to figure how to use it properly and how to solve the problems still there.

I simply don’t see how you end up with this reasoning. The auto-explore does not reach the ceiling of scouting performance. There is still plenty room for improve the efficiency and array of strategies by manually controlling the scout. All it does is rise the floor by a little bit, making a often tedious and stressfull task somewhat easier of newer players. It doesn’t withdraw them the possibility to learn improve. And, again, this is really a standard feature nowadays.

And what’s more interesting to me is that the auto-explore puts out to exactly that. Players can start to have a understanding of what to do with the scout off the bat. And then be inventive to reach further with it, as the game still enables for that.

Let’s try to not get too much ahead of ourselvs and stay optimistic!

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I will reply once.

Using a calculator, to help a child learn math teaches nothing. when the test comes they no longer have access to the calculator.

It helps them not at all.

If you never learn strategies to multiply and were given a calculator you will not know how to multiply when the time comes.

Calculators come after you know the basics and are used to increase efficiency. They are not designed to replace the human capacity to do multiplication.

Which in this scenario is exactly what it would do.

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I don’t understand what you mean with that, but ok. (???)

Thing is that the game as it is right now does not teach much already. What people come to learn is what the game still provides for them improve.

The AI scout is pretty basic, if some step of learning will be skiped (and I believe that you don’t actually skip, as you still learn it as it happens), it will only be that simplistic one. All the further more complex techiniques are yet to be discovered and developed, there is no replacement of capacity.

I don’t get the reason to be opponent about such a cool and harmless addition, that is standard for nowadays, to get implemented into the game. I really can’t picture it being a problem, at all.

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I also think implementing this feature is a pretty bad decision. Auto-Farm-reseeding was fine, because it involved no skill to do - just clicking. At least in the lategame when wood is no problem. In the early game turning it on is actually a bad thing, so having it avaliable there is fine as well.

Scouting on the other hand is a core element of the early game. Being able to skip that completely is just bad. Yeah, it will be less efficient than manual scouting and in the end I dont care if my opponent get’s the use that - if he needs it he is most likely far worse than me and will lose the game anyway. So I think in the end this specific change is not as bad as it seems at first for people who don’t plan to use it, but it brings 2 other big problems with it:

  1. It might make it even harder to actually get good at the game. Because it will be easier to get used to a lazy playstyle - I don’t think that argument is that strong either though. In the lategame people will need high apm anyway and once they have that they might figure at that they can use that as well in the early game. So I think once we think more about that, it turns out to be not that bad either.

  2. Here comes the real problem though: It shows a clear tendency from the developers to make more and more things automatic and that is actually terrible for the game. auto-farm-reseeding was fine. auto-scouting is a lot more dicy, but once we actually think about it it might be okay’ish and make some people happy. It’s much more on the edge for sure though.
    But I don’t feel like the devs are going to stop here. Once we get to auto-production of units, auto-conversion for Monks or whatever else you can think of it gets really bad and that’s where we’re heading I fear. Because you can make the exact same argument for those things as well: Manually ordering those things is still going to be better (as long as you can manage it fast enough).

So I think the specific change is not that problematic, but the direction the game is going is worrying - and that’s maybe even more terrifying than having a bad change to the game.

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Sorry I’m a little lost here: why or when Devs are thinking in adding that function, and how do you know about that? I think it’s a really bad Idea, and I sucks at scouting

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It was on a monthly newsfeed for Insiders.

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Gosh, why? I think i’mnever gonna buy this game. It’s like they’re trying so hard to change stuff that don’t need to be changed

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I don’t know about other RTS, but in AOE2, scouting can make a huge difference in any stage of the game: from early laming, to extra golds and stones, to relics. It just kills part of being a good player. I sucks at scouting, and with this I could be able to beat players that are just better than me. I don’t think is fair. I don’t think it should be implemented

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When it comes to QoL, there is a line. There is a balance between the game doing too little for you (AoE1) where the burden on players is too high and it’s not fun to play micromanaging literally everything, and the game doing to much for you reducing player agency (AoM expansions with autoqueue).

The game is in a good spot currently with MQ, a global queue tab to check production easily, shift queuing commands (this is what a good QoL change looks like for anyone interested).

Personally auto scouting is going over the line, it’s not a “quality of life” improvement like the changes listed above, it’s moving towards the game playing itself for you. I can understand having a feature like this for single player, but please leave it away from competitive ranked play.

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I’m now starting to think that we may be overly concerning about a thing that we don’t even exactly know how will work.

I feel that I’m repeating myself saying that, but, assuming that the auto-explore will occur like the AI does the scouting, none of that you mentioned will be featured, exactly. To take a taste just watch how the AI does it spectating a game. And every of that will still able to learn and do.

And since everyone will have access to it how come it could be unfair? I can’t see a person suddenly defeating a higher skilled opponent just for using a basic auto-explore tool ( a tool that is also available for the most experienced player) with a unit.

But anyways, I can be wrong on that, we will have to wait to see how it goes. My general thoughts is that I can’t frame it as a problem.

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I’d rather see auto-queue being implemented rather than auto-scout. It’s a nice QoL feature that will hopefully bridge the gap between new players and long-time players and doesn’t interfere with gameplay much.

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Please for the love of god no. Autoqueue absolutely shreds macro skill.

That would absolutely kill competitive gameplay, removes any skill expression because you would always have to use it to keep up.

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dededoritos I only started playing age in November, I’m new and low elo, I don’t want to play against people who have an ai scout, it will mess up the way I play the game, sending vils forward etc. Players should be punished for not scouting, the meta shouldn’t be changed based on the ‘newest’ players to age.

I find it disgusting that in matchmaking you can get an AI to help you scout. Who is this for, who asked for this, who thinks this is a good idea, absolutely no one in the community, not new players, not old players and I don’t care if “many moderner RTS games have this as a feature”, this is NOT Age of Empires 2.

I’ll go back to voobly, stop watching streams and remove myself from the community if they implement this. I don’t want anything to do with this.

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Hi there,

so I thought it might be interesting to just make a poll on this controversial topic to get an idea what the community thinks. Of course this doesn’t mean that what the majority thinks is for sure a good decision, but I’d find it pretty interesting to get somewhat of a bigger picture.

  • It’s good for the game
  • It’s not needed, but if people like it I’m okay with it
  • I don’t have an opinion/I don’t care
  • I don’t like it, but it’s not too bad
  • It’s bad for the game

0 voters

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as a lot elo player myself, the idea of auto-scout makes me sick, i dont want to play against people who have an ai scout, it’s not fair or balanced

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THIS. you know it’s a bad idea when you want to make things easier and the noobs tells you to stop (I’m a noob aswell, and I agree)

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Noob here, but I think auto-scout is not going to break the game. Like many people said, top players and intermediate players will probably not use this function, as manual scouting is superior. Auto-scouting is more for beginner level players, who can’t make sure the tc is running all the time and the same time controlling their scout efficiently.
In a beginner match up, if one player uses auto-scout and other one doesn’t (he/she might not know that there is such a function), then obviously the other player is going to have an advantage. So there might be a problem here.
But in the long run, if the player is willing to improve, and relies on manual scouting or realizes that auto-scout is not that effective (in order to know what opponent is doing, where the opponent’s man at arms/drush is, whether the opponent is forwarding etc…), manual scouting is going to make you a better player. Of course, we don’t know yet, what the auto-scout would be doing in these situations, but my guess is, it will be wandering across the map, and not patrolling in front of the barracks.
Regarding the auto-scouting after Dark Age, not sure, how much the coverage the scout is going to achieve, but they could implement a script that would not allow auto-scout after 10 minute mark?

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The thing is, at the end you have two options : either the auto scouting gonna be real good, forcing everyone’s to use it, and thus, being an skill killer, or, it’s gonna be a not so helpful thing, and only noobs will use it. And those who use it, eventually would have to learn how to scout by themselves. I think in the long run it’s easier to learn all at once, than to unlearn something to learn something else

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Let’s assume that the auto-scouting won’t be that helpful -> it would be suited only for beginners/noobs
If it’s helfpul even for better players -> nerf it, or embrace it (top players can focus on other things, the game quality will increase?)
Regarding learning all at once, when you first start, and you practice against AI, you will find yourself to struggle to achieve good up times, because you can’t find boars/sheep and you get frustrated. Not having the apm do all the things at once, I can see how beginners might find the auto scout helpful. You focus on mechanics of boar luring, managing your tc and maximizing your villagers efficiency. Then eventually you can improve your scouting skills.

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