There is a clear hierarchy between eco upgrades Wood, Farm, and then mining upgrade and looking at the pro level this is with very little deviation despite the effect of Build order or Civ bonuses could have an impact on your decision.
Double bit axe: it is just really good it will help no matter what you are making the only time I haven’t done the math but if you are going full eagles scouts it will have the least effect.
Horsecollar: The problem is that the pay of it has no short term pay off it offers it is a solid bonus once farms run out making along term commitment that not to say it a bad upgrade just that it can’t compete with DBA.
Goldmining: more expensive than DBA with a weaker effect Maybe you could justify it if you are going heavy Gold unit but otherwise wait for castle.
Stone mining: unless you are going full trush and follow up with rush and its rarely worth it and even then, full trush is a Yolo strats and Eco upgrades are a long term investment.
I am well aware that these changes will have reciprocation that will affect the viability of many strategies and I think these issue should be addressed concurrently.
Wood: either or nerf to 15% or increase cost of either food or wood by 25
Farm: All upgrades give +1 to carrying capacity
Mining: consolidated and also cost 100F 100W, or changed to 50F 100W.
I think that only the wood upgrades need a rebalance. Maybe the last upgrades also.
Every upgrade should come with an evalueation if it’s “worth” it in that situation. And the wood upgrades are a no-brainer.
The two castle age mining and also crop rotation seem to be a bit to weak and are most of the time not worth it. So these could be tweaked aswell.
But I doubt it will happen, it’s just too established how it is currently.
On the other hand… actually butting/cheapening the feudal upgrades could be a nice way to reduce fast castling on maps that aren’t designed for it…
But only the feudal ones ofc.
Why should the game be balanced around certain upgrades being objectively better. It’s just accepted that you should always get DBA first and then HC, in a strategy game your choice in upgrades should be based on your needs.
a) double bit axe is better than horse collar because you usually have more vils on wood than farms when you get it. (at the beginning of feudal age one is still eating sheep/berries, maybe there’s a farm or two)
b) farm upgrades arent a food upgrade, they are a wood upgrade. in build orders where you place loads of farms (eg scouts) you get it earlier, usually at the same time as wood upgrades
c) one usually has only a few villagers on gold, so it isn’t prioritized. if you have 5 vils on gold, you can get a +20% gather rate increase by adding another villager.
it’s also objectively better to gather food with your first villagers, not stone.
of course upgrades for the more needed resources get prioritized. you also need to choose between making villagers and town patrol at the beginning of feudal age, but this is also a no-brainer
But that’s exactly part of the issue. They aren’t only a wood upgrade, they’re a very delayed wood upgrade.
Especially when we consider the fact food is so expensive to set up and so many units are held back by food ecos, while conversely many units are specifically made viable by the fact they don’t use much food
We have a cart leading the horse situation
Not only are farm upgrades actually hurting your food stockpile, they only pay back in the long run, and primarily only pay back in wood… none of this makes actual sense when you compare to the wood tech and to other strategy games and the investment required
Why does wood tech hurt your food eco? Why does everything hurt your food eco but food is the slowest to come in, and simultaneously have units that don’t use food. Without knowing anything about the game you can know that non food units are better off when it comes to eco.
It’s taken so long for people to realise eagles are outstanding due to their opportunity cost?
True, I agree with you about this one, it’s indeed lack any strategic component when it’s mandatory.
No critical decision to be made.
What’s the problem with a long term investment, this, unlike the wood upgrades, has a strategic dimension to it.
But I see where you’re heading, I find it reasonable. I’d rather only change the Gold and Stone Mining upgrades. At least make the Stone one cheaper, 50F 50W. Perhaps same regarding the gold upgrade. This will encourage more aggression and versatility rather than just boom and a passive game.
Changing the farming upgrade will lead to the opposite effect. I think we should just accept the current situation about wood and food upgrades.
You will now get stone mining easier meaning defensive play is buffed
Simultaneously archer and eagle play is buffed by the change to gold mining
While you leave food untouched leaving all the current food issues and units being held back. How is this not obvious?
For example we could make farming upgrades MORE EXPENSIVE, but give them an actual payback opportunity. So either you invest in aging earlier or you buff your food eco. But if you buff it you actually get more food back by X min.
Also are we just going to ignore that heavy plow give +1 capacity if we care about consistiency that should either be removed or made universal I’m for making it universal because It makes food more accessable in the late game
My goal was mainly to buff HC and by extension scout play but what wrong with passive game It just means more games reach Imp. I love Imperial age, its where civs reach their true Identities their strength and weakness are amplified and you get a big dumb battle which leads to one player immediately resigning.
Tbf the main reason why you usually don’t get gold upgrade early is the lack of enough vils on gold. If you had 10+ gold miners when arriving to feudal people probably would make it more often. For instance for some of that cheese strats where you don’t really make farms but have half your eco on gold you should get the gold upgrade.
And there certainly is a strategic dimension to making horse collar. If you wanna boom in early castle age getting it is kinda mandatory (otherwise all your farms run out when you need wood for other stuff).
Yay, I was wrong there is no reason not to delay HC to until the first farm is about expire. also Sicilians exist. you could easily get HC and then Heavy Plow and never have to reseed a single farm until late castle
Our meta is too passive, we cant make it even more passive, and that’s despite how open the map is and how fragile walls are. Pseudo aggression style is boring. We need to give the aggressor the credit to go for an ALL-IN move.
Currently all games end up with a 3TC economy, It’s not about games reaching Imp or not, many games these days end in Castle Age due to overly investing in mass TC’s and big eco. Two years ago you could see much more Fast Imp on Arabia, pretty much most Lierreyy games. (1TC, Vikings style)
We need to reverse it. That’s why I support the mining change you offer.
if the upgrades are balanced properly, then the civ balance just gets worse
civs like britons / chinese / mayans will be able to afford them easily (and pull further ahead) while the civs without dark age bonuses cannot
you’re not wrong that the upgrades are not real decisions and we get the same ones every time. but the civ balancing is quite horrendous, so there isn’t any real fix for the issue
the main change i’d like to see is more nuance in the farming. the game railroads us down the path of getting horse collar and then sinking all our woods into farms at the same time. there would be more build order variety if that could be staggered instead of everyone being at a resource deficit during the same 11-16 minute window