This pass weekend tournament Bo3 allowed the showcasing of all the stronger civs in the game, and in my opinion no other civs were more consistently and relatively easily dominant than Rus and HoL.
Both civs have ultra safe infinite resources production very early into the game, and both civs have effectively trash units (costs wood and food) that are beyond broken when all the buffs and civ synergies kick in.
It just wasn’t fun to watch as these civs had zero weaknesses to exploit? Can it really be the best of the best and also the rest of us “just haven’t figured out an effective counterplay”?? (I remember when Delhi got nerfed for less than this…).
Infinite early and safe resources paired with cheap, strong and highly mobile units, isn’t competitive RTS (Rus). Likewise, a cheap trash composition that can outright obliterated expensive gold unit compositions on the backdrop of safe eco at home, is also not competitive RTS (HoL). What exactly is the opponent supposed to do tactically??
I only dont like the sycronized shoot in HOL.It dont have any downside effect and it can one shot your backline with long range.This ability is absurd it needs a downside like %100 reduction in attack speed for 10 second or a movement speed reduction.
Although I believe Rus and HoL are most toxic, the concept that really irks me is the meta is still:
remain in your base for a billion years and FC raid the other guy to death or omegalul boom in base then raid the other guy playing the map.
All in or even early high intensity aggression is not viable the higher you get in rank outside the one main POI map.
One more secretly very op civ is Knights Templar if you dont stop their pilgrim gold income their army will always beat you.In imperial their horses got so much charge damage that can 1 shot your man at arms.Also Teutonic Knight is so op and cheap for what it does.It can defeat gilded man at arm on 1vs1 and it has -2 armour aura which is very strong specially in team games.People are saying they are too slow but when they enter your town where are you gonna run?
HoL makes this game unplayable. If you’re not a pro, it’s often gg and seldom fun. How is it a good idea to be able to base build with impunity and have great eco and get strong burst of units on demand???
Malian got nerfed for less than this. The original FC famriba build where you only collected gold with the tower landmark then spam musofadi/javs. Or the following Fulani cow boom into FC sofa gg. Both fast castle builds got nicked for being less oppressive than this HoL stuff.
Lancasters can create a defensive landmark in every age.
Feudal: Lancaster Castle.
Castle The White Tower.
Imperial: Berkshire Palace.
On top of this completely insane selection, they are able to boom and generate resources inside of that defensive labyrinth, and have extra bonus features such as spawning free units, that helps them in achieving this goal.
Putting aside the fact that this type of design is toxic, keep in mind that this is an English VARIANT. It should stand out and be different than English, but instead double downs on everything that makes English unique. In other words, in a world where English was the colour Red, Lancasters have overtaken that role and English is now an off-Red flavour.
This design and KT’s lack of Lumber Mills is just unacceptable.