The logic behind argument 1 is that you can’t end games efficiently if siege units were made too weak or mediocre, even if you had great eco advantage over your opponent. (You opponent is probably still gonna lose but it will take you an unnecessarily long time to win)
Argument 2 is saying if siege units were made strong, then it would be very hard for you to counter them because now there’s no hard counter to sieges like the old springald and culverin.
Argument 1 and 2 together imply that the current siege balance direction is not on the right track because there’s no good way to balance siege units under the new mechanics.
Another way to see this is the springald is in an awkward position. It is immobile (you cant kite with them), expansive (similar cost as knights), bad against fast moving targets, cant shoot through walls, can deal good damage only when you have a frontline (sounds like archer/xbow) and when your opponents army had a bad formation.
Then the question is why wouldn’t I simply make more xbows and archers?They are cheaper, much more mobile, they deal consistent damage, have smaller models, shots don’t miss, shoot through walls, and last but not least, they counter other siege units.
Crossbows don’t shoot thru stonewalls either. Yet all range units shoot thru palisade walls. Archers and crossbows ARE more cost effective than springlads when the enemy mass is small and or properly spread out. However masses eventually grow and in that moment the splash total dmg you get from springalds cant be matched not even by fully upgraded HC!!
example
HC vs melee 42dmg per 2.12s per 240 resources
Springalds 25dmg x melee inf per 2.875s per 250 resources. With just THREE infantry units springalds are stronger than HC!! NOW imagine the realistic blob and the 15 to 20 something units that receives anywhere from 15 base dmg up to 25 dmg???
so range infantry are best when you need the mobility and you can’t afford to make an impervious front. But??? If ever you can make an unstoppable front and you dont desperately need the mobility?
Lastly its never a real EITHER OR situation! You can mix and match and switch in and out as needed!
Sadly it is an either or situation, we have siege tower in the game, but nobody builds them because there are more efficient ways to deal with units on stone walls. When two unit roles overlap, people almost exclusively go for the better one. I don’t want to see more units in the game end up being like siege tower.
But i gave several examples how these ranges units can differentiate in combat situations?
One can kite the other cannot
One has a static efficiency the other grows in efficiency
One has reasonable siege vs buildings and the other is worthless as siege.
Likewise one can soft counter siege units while the other is worthless as a siege counter.
And so on and so on.
They do not overlap in all functions aka great unit diversity as it should be!
Good “diversity” you have there, but unfortunately there’s only 4 types of resource in the game, you gotta spend them wisely and carefully because making transition from one unit to another costs extra resource making production buildings, and you also have to rally your limited vills on corresponding resources. I would make all types of units if I had unlimited resource and pop cap to deal with any possible unit composition of my opponent. But the reality is you don’t want to build units having as much overlapping roles as possible.
If a game goes late late, you’ll absolutely have to often transition unit compositions to adapt to the fights. Exceptions to this rule are OP civs that have the special one composition fits every situation which is actually horrible in concept for a REAL TIME STRATEGY game.
Examples of the exception. Hi I’m Abbasid 3+ TC ECO WING and I’m gonna never leave my base and make wood food camel archers and it will answer basically everything feudal or castle you throw at it??? This is not RTS…
Seriously though, abbasid goes for 3tc specifically because of their bonuses that reduce eco building cost and villager cost. Other civs reach the same point in production with a lower cost, 2tc song china comes to mind, and have a higher lethality in feudal/castle.
I agree with Cheddar on this one, and on diversity… it’s reduced signifcantly with these changes. They’ve given archers and crossbowmen more roles than they had in the previous patch, and basically reduced siege to singular roles. (Somewhat counterintuitive considering the argument to alter springalds design)
The overlap between siege and ranged infantry means it is better to go for the more adaptive unit, the infantry in this case, making siege almost obsolete outside of killing buildings.
What that means for diversity is having less reason to train units other than ranged + cavalry, because they counter everything you would fight. Ie, less diversity
Yes now why couldn’t you make transition to springalds in the late game and adapt to the siege war before this patch tho? The role of springald was much more unique.
I’m convinced with this comment you misunderstood the change to springalds? Springald transition was WAY TOO EFFICIENT. Someone’s dominant Siege mass could readily be countered the very next fight with few springalds and key micro victories; then it would always DEVOLVE into springald vs springald wars (boringgggg).
now that counter to springalds are not springalds; which encourage unit diversity AND it allows a well earned siege victory to establish a longer advantage.
It’s just so weird to me. For all the criticism people give the previous meta the only thing people can define it as is “boring”.
But now the prime counter to archers is archers.
I know what you’re thinking, use horsemen. Right? That’s why archer based armies train spears, and then it’s back to archers to counter that.
Mangonels lose to archers and crossbows now, so we’re just slapping armies against each other.
It’s an obvious problem that was identified over a month ago. Apparently, having less diversity in gameplay, seeing the same composition every game, is an improvement over specialized units that counter heavy hitting artillery.
Or as critics call it: “boring”
PS: the difference between past and current siege warfare (trebs and bombards attacking a base) is a losing player had a chance to make a comeback with cunning and skill. What siege warfare is now is just a snowball effect, if you can’t kill their army it’s pointless.
Training bombards to counter bombards is like a sick joke.
Boring is a legit critique to a game mechanic? Nobody liked springalds vs springalds fights??? Are you supposing it wasnt mind numbing?
Archers vs archers is not an honest observation ? Literally you can pull any 1600 elo + game off of aoe4world.com and see this observation of yours doesnt hold??
If you watched any of the drongo octagon series as well you can also see it never devolved into range vs range?
Please post a 1600 elo+ game that devolved into range vs range?
So far I’ve seen more unit diversity in the replays streams and tournaments so far. For example rewatch anotands streams or in game replays and tell us those game devolved into range vs range?
Wam vs anotand mirror match on Dry Arabia , both playing Juicy (if there was gonna be a range vs range MU it would have to be this one no?)
Dude, every one of those anotand games had exactly what the OP was talking about…
Edit: it took me forever to find the game you referenced (4:02:00 if anyone is curious)… don’t really get the point you were trying to make? Both players respond to mass amounts of ranged units by using (anotand vs wam) MAA or (wam vs anotand) zhuge nu.
the large ranged masses, which did exist despite your inaccurate description, did not lead to siege being built to counter them… instead it turned into more ranged units or MAA. The cavalry on anotands side came out in imperial and beyond when he swapped to grenadier + lancer/horseman spam.
this is the exact thing OP was talking about???
it’s not just the ranged units either, if anotand is spamming spearman and MAA… why not choose to build springald, which is being touted as a superior counter? All siege that counters units got neglected in favor of non-siege unit counters, that’s literally THE issue…
As Shneider said, boring is legitimate. Where we disagree is in response to you. If you find archers vs. archers boring, I consider that valid feedback for the devs.
The difference comes down to “can it be fixed by balance or can it be fixed by design”. This is why the siege rework happened. Not because springalds were necessarily imbalanced, but because the progression of siege into the lategame could not be fixed with balance. It required redesigning.
Balance out of the gate is not going to be perfect.
Think of it as similar to the naval rework. The difference was there, in my opinion, twofold:
a) water maps were less popular, so feedback was less divided as less players were invested in water gameplay, and
b) the naval redesign was a rather safer cookie-cutter approach that enabled future experimentation, vs. the significant design shift of the new siege design.
Old adage, and it normally applies to balance changes: Players are right about the problems, but wrong about the solutions.
I see problem solving, particularly in game development, as a skill set that takes time and practice to hone. In that sense, I trust the developer to make well reasoned decisions to address balance. It’s generally why I try to refrain from offering suggestions on how to solve the balance: as a player that isn’t a role I’m best suited for.
It feels like a battle to describe an issue at times. Thinking that the balance was poorly managed does not mean that nothing should change. Fans need to stop fighting with each other over competing ideas on “how to fix it”. Logically, that’s not how they decide on how it gets balanced.
This thread was made to identify a problem. Seems to me, where some people see an issue others see a solution. What the current struggle in the fanbase represents is people who prefer siege countering siege and people who do not. As you said, balance vs design.
To take it back to your naval example, this meta change is equivalent to making water gameplay obsolete. You can use it in a game, but it’s arguably less effective than using other tools at your disposal. That going for water at all would be a setback.
People may hate playing with or against water, but you can play on maps without it (it’s common for people to use their map vetos for that!). Siege is in every game, and it’s no longer as effective as training ranged or cavalry as counters.
Boring is valid… but it lacks the depth and nuance that has been given in feedback to the changes made in season 9.
You’re literally switching your points as you go???
You first say
Then i said 1600 elo games do not devolve into archer vs archer. And post an example of a game that anyone would think should devolve into mass range vs range that did not??? And you go on to admit my point and try to pass it off as your own??
You even post the graphic of the total unit types created where anyone with eyes can see several units types are created and the vast majority of units created aren’t even range units?? Wtf ?? How did you watch that game and see the graphics of the units made and suggest this devolved into mass range vs mass range??? Or try to suggest making maa to respond to mass range is consistent with your analysis that the answer to archers are more archers???
You posted that video as some kind of logic trap. I said it was a prime counter not the only counter. It’s zhuxi dude, they don’t build archers lmaooooo
You can’t even see that what you posted showcases exactly what OP is frustrated with.
In four hours of gameplay the only siege built is trebuchet and bombard. 3/4 of those games are ranged/cavalry based armies. You had to cherry pick a mirror match, and even then… you counter shaolin fc knight play with spears, not zhuge nu
? Literally you can pull any 1600 elo + game off of 
