With the latest AoE2 patch, one of the most interesting changes is that the projectiles from both the Heavy Scorpion and Scorpion units are now affected by Ballistics. This means that their shots will better track moving targets, improving accuracy and making them deadlier against units on the move.
My thoughts:
Impact on Gameplay: This greatly increase the effectiveness of Scorpions in massed situations, particularly in dealing with cavalry archers or even knight
Balancing Concerns: While this makes the Scorpion more viable in a wider range of scenarios, thereās a concern it could make them too powerful, especially when combined with siege-heavy civilizations. On the flip side, some might feel that Scorpions have always been underutilized, and this change could make them more relevant.
What do you all think? Is this buff too overpowered or just the right boost?
People are used to units like Mangonels, Crossbows and Knights to be super strong if they see another unit come close to them they start crying āOP!ā.
Roman Scoprions with a heavy discount, faster attack speed, reduced minimum range and ballistics were never OP so if Scorpions with that many bonuses are still bad then giving everyone Ballistics is surely not an issue.
Khamer might be a little too strong now since they already had good Scorpions before.
Celts already have amazing Onagers so this doesnāt really make them much stronger as a civ overall.
Well, from reddit Iām seeing people are complaining that counter units are not countering scorpions. Someone made a claim which is yet to confirm - 40 paladins lose to 30 celts heavy scorpion which was not the case before.
If the ballistics scorpion is truly as overpowered as Hera suggest, itās worth asking why we havenāt seen Roman ballistics scorpion , who has had the ballistics scorpion since the release of roman DLC at May 16, 2023, dominate the conversation in competitive play. Pro players, who constantly analyze and exploit any potential edge, havenāt been vocal about Roman ballistics scorpion being overpowered.
I personally think Romans should get an extra something after this Scorpions buff.
This is such a welcome change. It was so irritating to see archers hitting their targets and scorpions missing.
Units = 30 Celts Heavy Scorpion vs 30 Magyars Paladin.
Place = A choke pint in an actual BF map.
Results -
No Ballistic = Paladin wins all the time with 15% to 40% HP depending on pathing, scorpion stance (aggressive vs stand ground), scorpion targeting.
Ballistic = Paladin barely wins if scorpions are on aggressive stance. Scorpion win with 11 to 18 units left if on stand ground stance.
My conclusion = High PA melee units probably canāt counter good scorpions in a choke point.
I am not sure, I cannot login my old account and this is my new account. I also cannot visit my profile page and update my profile pic. I think this is the website issue
I guess with stand ground stance + move attack backward will work better
The question is not really if Scorpions are generally op and generally need to be nerfed because Roman ones were not OP when they had Ballistics.
The question is are the few Scorpions that were string before the change too strong now.
Like Khmer and Celts for example.
Then the bonuses of those civilisations should be adjusted instead of ruining the unit for everyone else.
Not Op but powerful for Khmer against civs which neither have bombard canons nor onagers with siege engineers.
Usually yes. Thatās how unique unit nerf cry posts begin but fortunately this time no. Happy that 89% of the community see it as balanced. Remaining 11% probably use too much infantry in their games.
Might have been a poor melee pathing issue with paladin shuffling around or freezing. Or he might have fought in a black forest choke point area.
Ya sure for content creation. This game must be either one of his 1v3 series against 900 elo players or some ranked game where he matched with someone 500 elo lower than him. Otherwise he almost never makes heavy scorps. Btw most pros are resistant to changes which donāt fit their gameplay. I remember that he also wanted ALL unique units nerfed which is crazy imo.
Exactly. That civ also has lower minimum range and 45 gold discount on them by default.
As I did a test and posted it on a different thread. 30 Paladin lose to 30 Celts FU Scorpion very badly. Not sure about 40 Paladin. I think it will be very small edge to Paladin. Also in my test the choke point was still 8-10 tile wide.
FU Celts scorpion is now way stronger than FU Romans scorpion. Romans need more numbers to match Celts which they can. But usually donāt happen as you stop producing scorpions after you reach your preferable number. So you will always see people complaining against 40 Celts Scorpion but wonāt see about Romans as they will also have 40 scorpions that are a bit weaker.
Imo they were already op in some team game scenarios where you had Romans and Khmer combined.
100% agree, those two plus Chinese will be a nightmare to deal with.
I think it will not be too powerful in Castle Age, but in Imperial Age, when they get quite easy to mass and all the UTs for the civs mentioned above kick in, this will need some further balance. Maybe they should re-up the upgrade cost of Heavy Scorpions.
