Should the next DLC be: Slavs rework, Croats, Serbs, Romanians?

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
631

Ur talking like Europe is half of the world.

But I somewhat agree Vlachs and Serbs should be added eventually, but no one else.

632

Vlachs at most because they already have a Campaign symbol, a geographically suitable placed Campaign and Vlad Draculea as Hero. The technical work effort of adding Vlachs would therefore be the easiest way for the developers.

633

I agree, but I believe that’s because everyone imagines their favorite region when it’s about a regional DLC.

The devs can do what they want, but in my opinion, if they want to please everyone, they should give up on the reginal DLCs and make a DLC with a little bit of everything. And reintroduce the 3 civs/dlc + rework like they did in Dynasties of India. That was the peak.

This is why I think everyone would like something like this:

  • Zapotecs
  • Romanians
  • Nubians
  • Slavs rework

Yes, you might not like the full package. But there’s part of it that everyone will like. Where as if you make a regional DLC, there’s a 100% change that part of the fanbase will be dissapointed and have nothing to like in the DLC.

634

Dracula’s campaign could really use a rework, not complete overhaul, but some fixes:

  1. End of Mission 2 → At the end of the intro in the 2nd mission it says: “Bogdan II, Dracula’s cousin and the new Voiveod of Moldavia”. This is not correct. Bogdan II was Dracula’s uncle. The creator of the campaign in Forgotten Empires likely confused him with his son. His son, was Vlad’s cousin, he was Prince Stephen who helped him take back Wallachia in this 2nd mission. And after becoming the new Voiveod of Moldavia (because of other events not in the scope of this campaign) would help Vlad take back Wallachia from the last time in Mission 5. So if a voice editor could be used to change “cousin” into “uncle” it would be great.

Wallachian & Moldavian politics would put Game of Thrones to shame since rulers would change quickly, so I understand Forgotten Empires Team’s mistake, but it would be a nice detail for historical accuracy.
This is the timeline in Moldavia:
→ Bogdan II
→ Vlad comes, his cousin Prince Stephen helps him.
→ While Stephen is in Wallachia is father is killed by his uncle who takes the throne.
→ Vlad the Impaler helps Prince Stephen to take back his throne (not a mission in the game)
→ Prince Stephen becomes Stephen III of Moldavia, and actually rules for 47 years (unique in W&M at time)
→ Stephen III of Moldavia ne(textGetsCensored)ciates Vlad’s release from Hungary and helps him take Wallachia in mission 5.

  1. End of Mission 4 → Not sure why this isn’t mentioned, but it’s worth pointing out that Vlad was waiting for reinforcements from Hungary, as they promised since the beginning of the war (they were supposed to arrive since mission 3 at Giurgiu). Instead, King Mathias betrayed and imprisoned Vlad. Perhaps this should be mentioned in the outro. Basically, King Mathias tricked Vlad to fight a war alone, promising he’ll come with the army in Wallachia but never did, and when he lost, King Mathias imprisoned him to secure good relations with the Ottomans. (Kind of poetic, Vlad hated treachery)
  2. End of Mission 5 → Fixing the historical inaccuracy at the end saying he died in battle. Actually he won. This can be easily checked by Wikipedia saying he reign 3 times. He died 1 and a half year after that, betrayed by the boyars and given to the Ottomans (which is ironic considering he hated treachery the most). But he didn’t die in that battle as the game says.
  3. During Mission 1 → You have 3 Romanian voivods. There are 2 issues with this:
    a. The name of lords/dukes in Wallachia and Moldavia was boyars. Voivod, at the time of Dracula, meant ruler of the country. Only Dracula himself was voivod. So the 3 random voivods should be 3 random boyars.
    b. Jakub, Mircea and Istvan are not real people who helped Vlad the Impaler, they’re randomly named.
    c. Jakub and Istvan are not even proper Wallachian names. Only Mircea is a Wallachian name. And they are supposed to be Wallachian noblemen.

Instead, the first mission should use real people who actually helped Vlad III instead of generic nobleman names:

  • Vlad the Younger (nobleman & brother; the youngest of the 4 brothers: Mircea, Vlad, Radu, Vlad; he was not sent to the Ottomans and supported Vlad the Impaler when he returned; he would rule in 1481 as Vlad IV the Monk being placed on the throne by Stephen III of Moldavia, until 1495 when he was ousted by Mihnea the Evil, son of Vlad the Impaler. But in Vlad the Impaler’s life, he was a loyal ally)
  • Vintila Florescu (nobleman)
  • Neagoe de la Strehaia (most powerful of his allies, nobleman, ruler of Craiova)
  • Giacu Balaceanu (nobleman)
  • Udriste Manea (nobleman)
  • Commander Gales (nobleman & general, he failed to attack the Ottoman Camp from the east during the night attack, while Vlad the Impaler attacked from the west; some sources blame Gales for the failure of the night attack and wonder why he didn’t attack, whether it was intentional or miscommunication)

Source: https://www.youtube.com/@CorpusDraculianum/videos

"This is the official channel of the international research project CORPUS DRACULIANUM, the main authority in the study of the life and times of the Wallachian voivode Vlad III the Impaler Drăculea (1431-1476). This channel provides exclusively scientific researched and referenced facts packaged in a format easy to absorb by the general public and history buffs: no vampires, no Balkan stereotypes, no commercial non-facts, only source-based history!

We are professional historians from universities and scientific institutes in Germany and Romania. We spent more than a decade finding hundreds of medieval documents and chronicles on Vlad Drăculea in many archives and libraries.
We are sharing our knowledge and the latest key findings, which help us look beyond the myths and legends of Drăculea."

Expected result:

Mission 1: * Wallachian Boyars (Romanians): The three boyars control fortified positions in the southern half of the map, Vintila Florescu commanding the east, Neagoe de la Strehaia the center and Giacu Balaceanu the western force. They each give Vlad a quest and grant control of some of their troops upon initiating their quests.

Mission 2 Outro: Bogdan II, Dracula’s uncle and the new Voivod of Moldavia, had heard of his kinsman’s plight and offered his help. If Dracula could cross the Carpathian Mountains into Transylvania and ally with Hungary, then they could launch a three-pronged assault on Vladislav II and the Turks.

Mission 4 Outro: * (
)I watched Dracula’s boat float downstream.

I heard he went to Transylvania to receive help from the king of Hungary, but he was betrayed an imprisoned.

The stone bastions of Poenari never caught flame, so I was spared(
).

Mission 5 Outro: All of the outro text is incorrect. It should be remade, stating that he won, and his cousin Stephen III of Moldavia left him 200 bodyguards and left, Dracula tried to stabilize his rule once more, but the boyars betrayed him and gave him to the Ottomans. Perhaps the campaing could be ended with this real life Dracula quote:

“When a man or a prince is powerful and strong at home, then he will be able to do as he wills. But when he is without power, another more powerful than he will overwhelm him and do as he wishes” - Vlad the Impaler

And other quotes from him since we’re here:

"A sentence that doesn’t reflect good, that nobody hears about and nobody has anything to learn from, is an useless sentence.” - Vlad the Impaler

“They [the thieves I kill] depart Earthly sufferings for a better afterlife” - Vlad the Impaler

“You understand now; for them, and for all enemies; Yes, I wanted to be ruthless! Let fear enter in them once and for all. Because only with terror could I change anything in this world.” – Vlad the Impaler

“You’re right. You are the messenger of a great ruler. I made this spike for you!“ - Vlad the Impaler, after the Ottoman emissary said he cannot be harmed because he is the messenger of a great ruler.

OPTIONAL:

All of this ^ was fixing an incorrect depiction of events. This is not about fixing an incorrect depiction of events so it’s optional. Vlad Dracula’s campaing has the potential of being a co-op campaing:

  • In mission 1, player 1 could play with Dracula as Romanians (loyal Wallachian retinue) and player 2 play as Turks.
  • Prince Stephen/Stephen III of Moldavia could be the co-op partner for missions 2/5. (real person)
  • Commander Gales could be the co-op partner for the missions 3-4. (real person)

Make the following characters Heroes:

  • Vintila Florescu, Champion (pro-Dracula boyar from mission 1)
  • Neagoe de la Strehaia, Paladin (pro-Dracula boyar from mission 1)
  • Giacu Balaceanu, Arbalester (pro-Dracula boyar from mission 1)
  • Stephen III of Moldavia, Paladin (Dracula’s cousin from mission 5, rename ‘Prince Stephen’ for mission 2)
  • Commander Gales, Knight (general in service of Dracula in missions 3 and 4)

Having some more heroes would add more immersion to the story.

Timestamp: 2:50, extra history got it right that Bogdan II was his uncle and Stephen III of Moldavia/Prince Stephen his cousin.

635

There is no one else after that, just breaking umbrellas i think. Or adding countries that no longer exist.

But i think Serbia and Wallachia should be added in one DLC, after they make African and Asian DLC.

3 Likes
636

We already have countries that no longer exist already goth hun cuman besides serbs are slavs so a current umbrella split.

Finns romanians albanians are groups not covered by any other umbrella currently ingame.

2 Likes
637

I can’t stress enough how misguided this statement is. Yes Serbs are Slavs as an ethnic group, but they aren’t represented by Slavs faction in-game because they represent the Rus. That’s like saying that for example Seljuks and Gokturks and Tatars are all represented by Turks faction in-game because they are all Turkic ethnic group, but everyone knows that they are Ottomans.

1 Like
638

Yes im fully aware they are rus and they should be split.if not for dotd poles bohemians were also slavs ingame. Before adding tatars all of Turks were represented by turks.The fact remains until serbs are added the closest thing they have is slavs.

1 Like
639

You got to admit the Slavs with their current name are very weird. We have:

  • Slavs (who based on their in-game civ are really the Ruthenians/Rus rather than all Slavs)
  • Bulgarians (who are Slavs)
  • Bohemians (who are Slavs)
  • Poles (who are Slavs)

So I don’t think the Slavs can be called an umbrella anymore, it’s not “a bit of everything”, it’s just the Ruthenians/Rus.

And yes Romanians cannot be covered by Slavs, in the same way the French cannot be covered by the Teutons/Goths even though the French have more Germanic influence than the Romanians have Slavic influence.

640

The upcoming Live stream of 23 February already does throw his shadow. Will the Vlachs and the Slavs (Rus) finally get a campaign including special units? Because @Player870583437 writes something about it every day, it must happen like this
 And now enjoy the next 2 weeks :smiling_face:

3 Likes
641

Saracens are Arabs. They speak Arabic and not to mention, the term “Saracen” has also been used to refer to Arabs during the pre-Islamic period as well.

1 Like
642

Then you should look forward to the 23 February, maybe then the Saracens will get unique Arabic buildings


643

What’s wrong with the current buildings?

2 Likes
644

Whatever it is, Saracens shouldn’t even be thinking about it.

645

For me is that the case sure.

By the way, it would never occur to me, to want to incorporate “Oktoberfest” as a technology for medieval Teutons :smile:

1 Like
646

I have never suggested anything new for the Teutons civ - except Crusader Knight from Campaign as a new UU.

647

You have literally already proposed the “Oktoberfest”, which only came into being in Munich in 1815, for individual medieval German states (Bavarians), that you would like to have in the game. You know that too, but we can not always know everything.

If I remember correctly, it was in the following suggested topic on medieval German states, where I confirmed an error on your part discovered by @Szaladon

Read it here:

2 Likes
648

That’s be great but I believe the next DLC is going to be Chinese, Korean and Japanese campaigns. These 3 civilizations don’t have a campaign although they were in AoE2 since the beginning.

3 Likes
649

I am interested to see, how long the Stream will run and how long there will be reports about Age of Empires 2.

Sure yes the possibility of it being an East Asian campaign DLC, is therefore higher than otherone


650

Don’t get me wrong, I wish Microsoft would make us a surprise and not have only a campaign-focused DLC, but looking at the news, I think they would have mentioned new civs for AoE2 if that was the case as well.

  • Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition : We’ll reveal a brand-new campaign-focused expansion and an extended look at exclusive gameplay.

  • Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition : After giving our players a new way to play for free in 2023, we are excited to reveal a new DLC with new civilizations.

I think AoE2 devs are trying to experiment right now. If I were them, I’d do non-reginal DLC with a bit of civs from everywhere & slavs rework. Like the original Forgotten Empires & Conquerors expansions, nobody complained. Because sure, some people like non-Europe, some people like Europe (seems to be what keeps the forum on fire right now), so there’s no way you can please everyone with a regional DLC regardless of the region, make it spread and more people are likely to like it. Not every part of the DLC, but everyone will like a part of the DLC.

Based on Steam achivements, campaigns have 3%-8% completion rate, so I don’t know how profitable that is going to be. But at the same time, maybe a campaign DLC doesn’t take much work so it adds up. Microsoft tries to experiment at the moment.