I guess there was already a lot of discussion about Bohemians being way too strong on closed maps.
But I have to address this again, because it seems like the Support does not fix this issue.
Bohemians are ruining my favorite map, which is arena. (I am like 2k on Arena and 1,9k on Arabia. Most people know me by the name “Weizenesel”. Disliking Arabia but never skipping!!)
Arena is used to be a map, where micro is not as important and the game can go either way no matter which civ you pick. But with Bohemians this changes. I dont even know where to start my list right now.
They can do every strategy faster than every other civ in the game.
Monk rush with spears (23+2), Castle drop (23+2), 3 TC Boom (23+2)
Monk rush
2.1 You cannot counter their monk rush with regular scouts, due to their hard-hitting spearman.
2.2 They can drop 4 Monasteries instead of the regular 2.
2.3 They mine gold with an increased rate of 20%. (i consider every other civ gets the first mining upgrade for a monk rush)
2.4 while doing a monk rush they can easily affort a castle, either by buying or by mining stone 35% faster than everybody else.
2.5 And if you do heresy and try to sacrifice your half base for doing an all in push with rams and longswords, which is considered to be the only counter to their composition. They can build HC in Castle Age…
In addition you dont realise whether you are playing a monk rush or a castle drop, since bohemians have the same up time for both strategies.
3.1 In early Castle Age their unique unit is only countered by mangonels and monks with redemption.
So you have to go for mangonels as soon as you see those wagons. After seconds the bohemian player has redemption (20%/35% more gold you know) so your mangonels are worthless now. So you think maybe towers? Maybe a castle? The first is countered by another castle drop and the second is countered by buying up to imp… Both are things the bohemians are exceptionally good at.
Basically, the points 2 and 3 on Arena mean you are only reaching Imp if the bohemian player screws up or you are Sicilians (and Cumans), which i found to be decent (not strong only decent) against both strats.
Meso civs are strong against the monk rush since they have Eagles. (Anti monk without being cav)
But they are not ideal since the bohemian player just goes for the castle drop approach.
Early Imp
If you survived any out of this planet monk rush/castle drop.
You have to deal with wagons (or even arbs), bombard cannons and Halbs. And again you hope that he messes up his micro…
Late Imp
You can only play Rams, Standard Infantry and some cav to snipe.
Everything else is off the table.
No Ranged Siege → “No Gold”-Monks
(Almost) no Trebs → Houfnice + best protection
No archer → Houfnice + Wagons
No Cav Archer → Houfnice + Halbs + Wagons
… You get the idea.
And this composition limits the list of Civilasations to a minimum…
Most of them are not even able to get to that point of the game since bohemians stomp them in the early game.
I feel like there can be some counters in the game. That’s totally fine.
This makes picking in tournaments so crucial and breath taking.
Like Goth vs Mayans (hardcounter)
or Teutons vs Aztecs (decent counter)
But one Civ, which is good/hardcounter to every Civ except Aztecs, Sicilians and Britons, is just annoying.
When the DLC came out I liked to play Bohemians, because it was such a challenge. I just told myself they will be nerved at some point in the near future anyway. So I just try my best for those weeks. But Weeks became months. And I hope they do not become years… Please adress this issue soon!!
Lose the Castle Age mining techs, but keep the Feudal ones
Spears do less bonus damage, maybe only 15% or something.
Monasteries cost - 75 wood. Now they can only get three instead of four for that price.
Hussite Reformations lets you train monks for either food or gold, not just one.
Hussite Wagon main projectile recharges automatically after 10 seconds, so you don’t have to start a fight with the minor projectiles.
My more experimental changes to the Hussite Wagon:
The Hussite Wagon now only fires the main projectile at it’s primary target, either the one it is focus fired on, or the one it would naturally attack. It simultaneously fires the small projectile at 1-3 other targets in range, randomly selecting the number of minor projectiles for each shot. If there is only one valid target, it fires the main projectile, and a minor projectile at that target. That way, Hussite Wagons don’t have to worry about resetting the attack, and can fire on up to four units at once, but gets weakened against less units. I think that that could be a good solution, although some of the other numbers might need tweaking.
Hello sir, nice to see a 2k here:
I already know that Bohemians are OP on Arena and BF, their bonsues synergies so well, and at the same time they have insane UUs.
If you want to see them nerfed I suggest this:
Gold Shaft Mining and Stone Shaft Mining aren’t free anymore, having all mining techs for free is way too much.
Move the Monastery discount to Slavs or other Monk civ that need it.
Standard and Elite Hussite Wagon HP reduced to 180 and 220, so Mangonels are better vs them.
Houfnice AoE reduced.
Lose access to Siege Engineers.
Also, They aren’t the only ones that need to be adressed, Turks are also OP on closed maps and need nerf, and Poles too.
And before the guys that claim the civs don’t need a nerf because other maps exist appear here, if a civ is too OP, even at one settting, needs a nerf, and compensating with buffs is pointless, Khmer post buff is a good example, the civ received so many nerfs because were too OP.
The late game composition of bohemians is the scariest. Buffed halbs+hussite wagons+hounfice >any late game composition. Even portuguese halbs+ organ guns+ bbc is not the same level. Organ guns as a siege unit have min range. But hussite wagons does not and monks need redemption to counter.
The problem with niche maps are first and foremost the ability to civ pick on a ranked game, it leads to civ abuse, Tatars on Gold Rush, Persians on Nomad and Bohemians on Arena, game will never be balanced base on all maps in the pool, it’s an impossible mission.
With that being said, Bohemians are currently a horrible civ, gimmicky design that can easily be abused on closed maps like Arena. Developers made the civ too convinient, stream-lined into a very specific route.
Design flaws:
Having mostly late-game buffs ON TOP of a late-game eco bonus (Fervor+Mining Camp techs), how uninspired and unplayable it is, huh?
Having too much wood discount on too much random buildings, making Malians bonus laughable. Why? conviniency, yay.
Having Houfnice ON TOP Siege Engineers ON TOP of a speed buff ON TOP of the strongest Halbs in the game to assist them, to create a perfect composition, having just Pikes is way too artistic and complicated for them, it always has to be flawless, no holes, no counters. Cowardy design.
Lastly, Hussite Reforms. Trash Monks. Way too gimmicky considering the late-game is inflated with Hussars/Light Cav which rule the map at this stage, game is too chaotic to make this trash composition viable. But hey, let’s throw another gimmick in cause why not.
This civ does have some good aspects though, 2 very playable unique units (Wagon and a Castle Age HC), and a solid mid-game eco bonus that encourages non-meta play. (I’d remove the Fervor/Sanctity gimmick).
Based on our poor experience with Burgundians and Sicilians, don’t expect this civ to be reworked/redesigned. They never seem to bail on bad ideas. Sorry. :\
Just because you absolutely hate gimmicks and civs people enjoy to play doesn’t mean others are the same. Please just stop always complaining about civ picking and how civs are too easy to play.
Organ Guns are quite balanced considering how bad of a civ Portuguese are, we need them to have at least a single iconic feature or else they’ll remain the most generic civ in the game.
If anything, I’d decrease their hidden Siege Armor type to -8, therefore Organ Gun would die to a direct hit by a Mangonel rather than survive with 8hp left. (which what matters, since Organs shred the Mango if they stay alive)
Units dont necessarily have to have trash counters. Same can be said about Jannisariesy (you better make Crossbows against them rather than Skirms), most unique infantry units (Serjeants and Berserks get a honorable mention here) and Cataphract.
(Besides that Organ Guns are not that efficient vs. Hussars at the late-game you better have a nice bulk of Arbs.)
War Wagon, Arambai should and thankfully do lose to trash units, unlike Organs they’re mobile and can force a global win condition rather than a local one. This game is less systematic than we may think.
Countering UU with trash isn’t usually the way to go anyways. War wagons and arambai from 2 castles you just go counter by opening double monastery and this stops the push if the opponent doesn’t add other units.
But since when is double castle organ guns a thing? I mean for 1v1 that’s simply a bad strat (as were double castle UU from the other civs) but even in tgs I have never faved this strat.
Double castle organ guns is definitely a thing. I’ve seen it used pretty often on Arena. First castle at home, produce organs, send across the map, and then second castle in the face. Unless opponent really knows what they are doing then it is a pain in the ■■■ to defend.
Well yeah but that’s not double castle organ guns. This is just the regular one castle at home strat followed up by a second one forward. And that’s indeed quite common, yes.
Double castle UU means you go up 31 pop or so to feudal and upon reaching castle age you drop two castles immediately at home and try to kill your opponent with that soon after. It was popularized with arambai and after the nerf people started doing with wagons. Basically you abuse the fact that you have high dmg output UU that only cost wood and gold (which is why that wouldn’t work with jannis or conqs). But in the end it’s a chesese strat that at least in 1v1 doesn’t work if opponent reacts properly. In tgs your mate can make light cav or so to counter monks but tbh balance simply shouldn’t consider arena tgs as this setting allows so many weird things to work.
Please try stay close to the topic, so we can brainstorm about bohemians here.
There may be other Civs that are strong/too strong as well. However, I feel like Bohemians is something else on Arena.
It feels like Cumans on release of Age II DE.
Almost unbeatable. Only if the Bohemian player messes up. And that shouldnt be the case in a RTS like Age II. Doing the right strategy in the right situation should be rewarded.
Tbh I think your description of their opness is a bit exaggerated. Yes it’s fair to argue they have a bit too much bonuses for closed maps but it’s not that they do anything faster and better than any other civ. Like they certainly don’t have the best fc boom. Better than average I’d say but it’s waeker than some of the other civs as their bonuses kick in only after castle apart from the somewhat cheaper blacksmith. Also fc into castle drop with 23+2 doesn’t sound like a too good here imo. Wagons on their own are countered by mangos or redemption monks. So you usually wanna have your own monks behind to convert these units. And yes their late game is hard to counter but some civs have really nice comps against them (Italians, byzantines and mongols do really good here as well). However a lot of civs don’t have any counter to their comp that’s true but kinda difficult to adress without completely changing the civ. Like you mention britons as counter which is true for monk rush or other all in strats but late game britons are actually super bad vs bohemians.
That being said, pure smush or smush into castle drop and fast imp is somewhat op with that civ, I agree. I wouldn’t entirely remove the cheap monastery bonus as was suggested before but making them cost 100 or 125 instead of 75 could be good. And instead of removing both castle age mining techs I prefer to keep both free techs for gold and remove both for stone (or maybe the other way around, idk). Fervor for vils is completely fine imo. Lastly hussite reforms is just a stupid techs. It’s completely useless in most scenarios but if you enter the late late game transitioning into trash and siege it can be super op if you can squeeze it in. I’d just remove that tech entirely and replace with something else.
I’m usually in favour of solutions that give civs nice and sharp designs.
Eg aesthetically I think getting all mining techs for free is far preferable to only getting some mining techs for free.
I’d remove (or reduce) the monastery discount and tweak the Hussite wagons.
According to the wiki Hussite Wagons have an armour class that lets them take extra bonus damage from mangonels and BBCs (in addition to their bonus damage vs siege).
This reeks of bad design.
If the unit was too strong vs Mangonels and BBCs, it was probably simply too strong. “Fixing” the problem by granting Mangonels extra bonus damage led to the current situation, where they can apparently only be countered by Mangonels and Monks (with redemption).
A relatively easy fix would be to remove the Hussite Wagon armour class and reduce the hp so that a mangonel still takes out the unit in the same number of hits. That probably wouldn’t be 100% balanced, but it’d be a better starting point than the current stats.
Giving Hussite Wagons negative melee armour could also be interesting. They’re supposed to protect from knights, and knights have a relatively high base attack, so negative melee armour + high HP would suite their flavour.
Honestly the whole Hussite Wagon unit reeks of bad design. There was a cool idea of
“A unit which protects other units from arrows and cavalry charges”
and it was implemented in such a way that we now have OP not-quite-Organ-Guns with a little side note
“Oh right they can also be used to protect archers behind them. But don’t worry about that. You’re never going to do it.”
Salvaging the original idea would require redesigning the whole unit. It would require the unit to have low attack, and for it to be economical to mix it into a composition, which would probably require it to have a low gold cost.
On hating "gimmicks"
I sometimes like gimmicks, but I hate gimmicks which are implemented in a stupid half-assed manner like this.
What if Hussite Wagons gain the building’s armor class? That could bring more diverse sources of bonus damage, and it kind of makes sense that they are basically moving buildings.
e.g. most infantry, especially ranged; most siege, especially with siege engineers; tarkans, elephants, flaming camels, saracen archers…
Sure Bohemians still have answers to them all, but at least even the playing field a bit more.
Thanks for nice analysis. But I think most of the OP’s point is valid and some points of your post is also questionable so it is good to discuss.
Wagons are countered by redemption monk. Yes. But it means only Mangonels are counter for wagon for civ without redemption. It is different from other good Castle age UU such as Conqs and War Wagon. That’s why melee Unit should be more effective against Wagon.
Yeah. Maybe their late game composition is great but not THE BEST. I am curious about your list of civ. I think Italians are quite interesting case vs Bohemians because Condos are quite fast and counter all HC, Houfnice and Wagon with no upgrade requirement. Actually Bohemians can have hard time dealing with Mass Condos in early imp. But only in case if Italians can survive in castle age monk rush. They aren’t particularly good at dealing with Monk rush.
And Mongols late game composition theoretically good vs Bohemians with Elite Mangudai deals bonus damage vs Wagon and they have drill Seige Ram which can be very good vs Deathball of Bohemians. But Mongols lategame composition is very difficult to get to and Mongols eco is very weak after Castle age. More likely to die before that. Mongols can have advantage only if Bohemians have very bad map and Trush from Mongols is very successful (They have eco lead in early game).
And I don’t know why Byzantines are on that list of civ good vs Bohemians. Byzantines are good on Arena because of good defensive and early imp time with cheaper trash. But not good late game composition if you are not facing civ like Goths/Bulgarians/Vikings. Well Full skirms + seige can be good but seige can be easily sniped by Houfnice or Monks and skrims become just useless against Wagon.
I generally prefer more sharp civ design than bland design. That being said, I prefer entirely remove the problematic bonus and replace to another thing rather than just nerfing percentage.
Also I think Monks play generally need buff because monks are not good at long-term investment. However, Monks can become easily OP in early castle age when Army size is small and opponent cannot train Mass light cav. And Bohemians bonus exactly benefit monk play when the point when they are very good.
The bonus of other good monk civ such as Aztecs, Burmese aren’t that good when they get less than 1 or 2 monk technology. That is more good design for encouraging monk play in long-term. I can think about new bonus can replace monastery discount such as Fervor, Sancity give double the effect for Bohemians (On top of villager thing. Not double for villager). But, it also need rework on Hussite Reform that trash monk tanker and faster would be too much. If rework of Hussite Reform is difficult, it would be also good to just remove that bonus and replace completely different thing other than Monks.
I agree on that tech design is just stupid no matter it is OP or not. Better to completely rework.