One of my favorite civilizations to play is the Rus because of its flexibility. I almost always use Pro Scouts with this civ, but I never use it when I play with HRE and byzantine. However, I’ve noticed that more and more people are using pro scouts, even with civs that are not usually used, such as civs that have good farming benefits. Has pro scouts become a meta? If so, what changed to make this happen?
At high levels, when you understand the essence of each civ, that´s when you seee why pro-scout becomes profitable for many of them.
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HRE and Byzantines have mechanics that “benefit” them when harvesting at their own base, the HRE has its prelates, and the Byzantines have the Aqueducts. Harvesting “outside” is very dangerous, if we say, they are fighting against France.
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Spending some gold (which they also harvest quickly) to be able to obtain deer in your urban center, and within the range of the prelates and Aqueducts, is more profitable than transporting prelates very far or spending extra stone on distant aqueducts.
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France benefit quite a bit from Pro-Scout, since building farms would be more expensive (70 wood for each one, so only 5 are 350 wood… better Pro-scouts), and they have a Discount, also to protect their own Villagers.
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And Delhi, that one is easy: Pro-Scout is free, so it is totally mandatory to take advantage of it.
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Rus, it’s already obvious why it’s necessary to develop it, its bonus “revolves” around hunting.
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And with that, there are 5 civs that benefit quite a bit from pro-scout, including variants, 7 civs.
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As for the rest of the civs, well, many of them "are more profitable" to produce Farms and spend early on them rather than on Pro-Scout gold, mainly because many have cheap farms or with a harvesting bonus, like the English, Abbasid, ZhuXi, Japanese.
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Good points, friend! Makes perfect sense
Pro scouts is a very powerful research. There are many reasons to go for it, for one having a stable early in the game ensures that you will be training cavalry. That lets you take map control, and you won’t have any problems producing their normally food heavy units with the extra food. Add in the fact that early aggression is very easy to punish if all of your resources are covered by main TC, and any food you take off the map is taken away from your opponent.
It was always a very good tech, even before the QOL changes with drop offs. I think it taking far less APM makes it a no brainer. At the moment the best way you can respond is by killing the deer, as they will not show through the fog of war. That makes it much harder for your opponent to manage if they are relying on shift-clicking and focusing their attention elsewhere.
The hard part for me is catching and killing the scouts while they carry the deer away. If an opponent succeeds at bringing a single hunt back with 3-4 scouts then they invest 270 for 3 scouts (starting with 1) and 350 for the research for a payout of 2450. So, 620 resources for 2450. It turns into cat and mouse, and it only takes bringing back 2 deer to break even in the cost of the tech and scouts.
By the time they age up they can have the resources for the research and train the scouts by the time it finishes. I would have to know which hunt they go to first to intercept it, and I can have barely enough units to kill them on their way back. It is also hard to tell what they are going for based off of vil placement in dark age, because 4 on gold all else on wood is 3-4 build orders depending on the civ.
I like the tech, and I think it adds more to the strategy of the game than it takes away. It is getting annoying seeing it in every game at 1400+ elo though. Every civ I’ve played against goes for it, and I’m struggling in figuring out how to counter it. It is a high reward/low risk playstyle for sure.
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The problem now though is even civs that don’t want to go pro scouts feel forced to do so just because you cannot afford to allow your opponent to get all the deer. This is why you see even english going pro scouts just to deny the deer for the enemy player more than anything.
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This was a very good qol. This probably justifies the increased use of pro scout. But this improvement was very very good.
Nice tip!
Professional Scouts meta has made a resurgence with mixed feeling in the community. Some welcome it and other perceive it to be overtuned.
I’m in-between the two camps; as someone that use to delhi pro scout before the auto deer queueing, i appreciate the new simplicity, and it’s not until the season 9 food nerfs, that the larger set of players gravitate towards the power of pro scouts. But now that everyone is doing it almost every game? Is it a good or bad thing?
I lean towards its a good thing since it requires interaction with the map outside your base, where otherwise, players would at most send villagers to the nearest deer herd then transition into farms. If anything if the scouts got a slight speed nerf while carrying a carcass, it could help the countering. But OP overall for all civs?? Naw
The QoL change was great and definitely needed however now it has become too good for its price. I’d suggest increasing research time, increasing tech cost and perhaps also increasing the same a little on scouts to further delay it.
The issue with it now is even civs that don’t benefit from it much like byz or english are forced into it just to deny an opponent that is going pro scouts.
I disagree any civ is forced into pro scouts also i disagree that pro scouts should NOT be an every game tech. Wheelbarrow is an every game tech, maybe it should be changed so its use is more selective?
Except for china and a niche bee ayyubid build, pro scouts is a 5min-6min+ tech, which is sufficient time to make units and attempt to stifle the pro scout use. Anything much later like you’re suggesting would be so late that it would have zero benefits. You’d have ran out of in base food, and significantly cut into castle age timing.
Also did you just make an argument for 2 turtle OP civs would be forced onto the map as a counterplay to pro scouts, as a BAD THING???
Yes, because it points to the tech being so good that it is necessary for all civs to use, even those that lack an incentive.
It becomes necessary because it is useful to everyone, and the earlier you grab the deer the better. This is because once you have the deer under your main TC the opponent has no hope of getting them.
That’s what over powered means, that it is so powerful you leave yourself at a disadvantage by not using it.
There’s not really a counter to it other than using it yourself. You would need to invest 2-3x the resources to guard hunts, which has an immense opportunity cost.
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At high level it’s mostly pro scouts or lose atm, you get so much safe food and it’s so easy to do that you must contest it. It does depend on the map and the civ as some have easier time than others. Rus for example can already have 3 scouts before feudal and don’t need a stable straight away. French can contest this easier due to school of cavalry and early knights, delhi get it for free etc.
You can certainly make units and try and fight over the deer but it costs far more than simply just going pro scouts yourself, the tech costs like the same as 2 knights and you’ll need a stable for both.
Also whilst I understand people hate turtle civs, turtling is a valid part of any RTS. Turtle civs have bonuses that facilitate sitting in base more. If they are forced out despite their inherent bonuses that incentivize them not to then that shows just how good pro scouts is atm, too good.
By your logic wheelbarrow also needs a rework bc even the OP turtle civs use it??
A tech that everyone uses isn’t by definition OP?
ALSO, as usual, you mis use my qoutes to make fringe points. I said supposing that even English and byz has to leave their base to counterplay a tech, is a bad argument.
The whole point of the game is 2 teams try to kill each other and use resources on the map to gain advantages in their conquest. It is horrible game design that any civ can sit in base until imperial or indefinitely. If mechs are added to the game that force these turtle civs to RESPONSE? that’s called RTS.
SO we can already save us both the time but understanding we come from 2 different schools of thought. I dont think any civ should be able to sit in base indefinitely. And a mech that requires you to contest it out on the Map is RTS.
I think if you applied this logic to everything in the game then you would also believe that I think that training villagers is overpowered, since everyone needs to do that to succeed.
Wheelbarrow is not a tech that you use for every build order, as the cost is not returned immediately.
Pro scouts gives a player 1000s of safe resources, and can be used at ~5:30* when no player can stop them without losing a lot of tempo.
I’m mostly speaking from my personal experience on the ladder, 4/5 games I see this tech. It is effective and difficult to punish. It’s making the meta very stale.
(* China/Zhu xi as early as 4:55, Delhi as late as 6:45)
Pro scouts cost 75w 275g, 90s research at the mill. You need a stable (150w 30s build time) and reasonably 4
total scouts at minimum (3 trained at 70f ea. 20s ques) . That’s 710 resources ( almost a 2nd TC in cost). Then for you to make the tech worth it you need to be able to bring in your furtherest deer pack or steal from your enemy deer packs. Why isnt it worth it to just bring in your nearest deer pack? Bc you could more cheaply (100w tower 60s build time 100stone fortification, 50w mill 20s build time) and quickly send 5 villagers make a fortified tower on your nearest deer pack and scoop up the majority of the food available before armies get so treating that you’d have to abandon the post, especially if the enemy went pro scouts (which gives you even more time to safely eat your near deer).
Meanwhile your eating your nearest deer pack safely, you have unspent resources comparatively to the pro scout user to contest his tech, and at the time a faster deer meat to jumpstart your military production further over his.
Also why do ppl hate turtle civs?? You just stipulated, turtle civ is just part of RTS (to an extent i agree), but why do so many dislike it?? Its because if designed too defensively their isnt a point of attack, an explotiable weakenss, no RTS counterplay to their defensiveness. A civ that can sit in base until 15min?,in a likely 20-25min game, Imo, is stupidly designed. So if pro scouts forced said 15min+ turtle civs to respond to map control activities before the 15min mark, i call that a great tech, especially since we all have access to said tech.
A lot depends on the map and the spawn but when it’s a map with deer further out then I think it is always worth doing, sure there’s an investment but there should be if you’re getting thousands of safe food under your tc. Also as I mentioned some civs have other bonuses that make it even more effective such as delhi getting it for free, rus often go 2 scouts anyway and don’t need a stable to make scouts and they get bounty, china can offset their biggest weakness which is running out of food and an expensive farm transition when going 2tc song by simply going pro scouts and they can supervise to get the tech researched fast, zhu xi can do that too.
There’s plenty of counterplay to turtle civs, just go 2tc and FC, grab relics and take sacred sites, gather boar etc. Let them sit in base until you are ready then make a couple of trebs and take them out. I could understand the dislike before but now enclosures has been nerfed significantly, byz farms are now much more expensive and mercs are too so they cannot just sit in base and match your eco.
Are we talking 1v1 rank maps? Hill and Dale, Gorge, Lipany*, Dry Arabia, Himmeyama, Weltands; your nearest deer pack spawn right outside your base, sometimes it so close you can literally push the deer to a near depot if not directly under your TC.
Rus doesn’t have to pay for a stable sure but they still pay full price on the tech and still need 4+ scouts to make it worth it (560 resources, not cheap). Delhi doesn’t effectively get many of their techs for free, delhi really instead gets a significant discount by replacing the standard tech costs with the cost of scholars. Pro scouts is a 4min 22s research tech without any scholars (thats 8+ min if researched immediately on feudal). You’d need 4+ scholars to get a reasonable research time (260g over 2min training time, this is cheap, but its their perk).
And we’re not gonna agree on the turtle thing, especially if you’re convinced the standard response to say Abbasid 2-3Tc eco wing is FC relic, or the standard counter to eng turtle boom is fc relic and wait for a window.
We won’t because you don’t seem to understand what turtling is. Abbasid going 3tc isn’t turtling it’s a boom. Turtling requires significant investment in defense, some civs have defensive bonuses like english that make less investment necessary but abbasid just going 3tc is in no way a turtle.
Pahahaha so the quick walls dont count as turtling bc the walls are cheap???
While you get stuck on semantic, the vast majority of the player base will continue to show disdain for your "non turtle " abbasid, eng, byz, hre playstyle that allows you to sit in the small lil corner of the map for 75% of the game.
It’s not semantic, what you are describing is a boom. English aren’t necessarily turtling every game either, they may do the council hall rush or byz may do a FC etc.
The whole point of a turtle is to build up defenses. A simple abbasid 3tc boom is completely vulnerable to a ram rush and is in no way a turtle.
I think the ease they made to pick up deer makes it more viable and is finally an answer to 2TC, but I think some will combine and master picking up deer while doing 2TC.
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