Glad to hear that Devs are consider to modify those old variant civs.
This is indeed meaningful work that should be notice in the meanwhile of publish new DLC. I will provide some ideas to improving old variant’s design.
JDA’s problem had existed for a long time.
This civ’s design bind its overall military power with Heroine’s status. We will find that JDA always behave extremly aggressive in early game, as it can only rely on battle to gain exp to complete its military strength.
If you gotta fight with JDA, you have to tried your best to avoided to fell in battle with your opponent, until you got overwhelming counter forces such as a large group of crossbowmen then quickly struke back to end the game. This way of match is do boring.
In addition, the design of JDA is too similar with French. Perhaps we can try some more inventive ideas.
For these problems, I got 5 ideas:
1.Remove the relation between Heroine’s exp and Consecrate. The Available Frequency of Consecrate should not be affected whatever Heroine engage battle or not, and whatever which level Heroine are. As we known, Consecrate is so significant, if it can only bind with early battle, that’s means you are forcing player to fight earlier, this is harmful to the diversity of tactical choices.
2.Reduce the Penalty if JDA was not in the frontline or dying. I know the current design of JDA means Devs try to encouraged Heroine to participate in frontline battles, but we should avoid extremes. Like we can let Hero can gain exp in any position, but only half or even less if she isn’t close to battlefield.
3.We can try give Heroine exp when Booming econmy, like when training Villagers, Traders and Fishboats, or building another TC. In this way we can give JDA’s player some new tactic choice like booming but not fast attack.
4.Give JDA with JDA’s Champion and Rider in Feudal, and Remove the Early Royal Knight. Then give Heroine with ability of Healing Area like English King, her healing speed can be faster like Hospitaller but only working on JDA’s Champion and Rider.
5.Adjust JDA’s Champion and Rider to sort of universal unit. Champion can cause more damage to every light infantry. And Rider can cause more damage to heavy unit like Ghazi.
I believe this may lead JDA more unique but not some sort of Advanced French.
About ZXL, I believe this civ still well in current version, Pro Scout make this civ more aggressive in Feudal and Castle, but we should also notice that this civ’s Unit Tree is incomplete in late game.
As we known, ZXL got no Handcannoner which I have no intention to changing. But how can ZXL deal with large gruop of Cavalry in Imperial? Yeah, ZXL got good Crossbow, but the 10000 Bolts can only be get in Library Landmark, and Crossbow also can’t deal Horsemen for they are not heavy units.
Or can we rely on Spearman? No, Spearman is too cheap, its low price means that it can only passively resist and consume the resources of its opponents.
Actually ZXL’s IO design tended to actively gain tactical advantages by rapidly consuming resources to build massive Specialized Troops. But lacking of efficient anti-cavalry unit and Handcannoner in same time always makes this civ embarrassed in early Imperial.
So maybe we can make use of a neglected weapon, Fire Lance.
Why Fire Lance can’t turn to Fire Spear? Just like AOE2 just do.
Yeah, I know there is a Roar of Dragoon tech, however restricted by the low price of Spearmen, this upgrade actually very useless in game because you can’t let Spearmen too stronge otherwise they will be Spamed. How many players have you seen choose this tech in game?
So the best method is make a new Advanced Spearman by using Fire Spear, which is available after Imperial or research Roar of Dragoon. Name it like Fire Spear Soldier or whatever you like.
1.This unit may use the model of Castle Palace Guard just like English Wynguard Footman do, they can hold Fire Spear when idle but not only when charging, or you can give them with the animation of Heavy Spearman like Templars’, in these way they can be very identifiable.
2.It should consume Gold, to prevent being Spamed, to make it can only be used as anti-cavalry forces.
3.Don’t give them heavy armor, for heavy spearmen were do annoying. Maybe you can give them MAA’s HP.
4.They shouldn’t have faster speed, for you can’t let them keep up with Palace Guards to make ZXL’s harassment very triesome.
5.Their weapon’s firecracker can be triggered when Charging or Crouching, to make additional damage to Cavalry. Don’t give them too much basic damage.
ZXL should be a civ that tend to build Specialized Unit to gain initiative, Fire Spear Soldier can effectively supplement its Unit Tree’s deformity after Imperial.
In fact, I also wanna try to improve OOTD.
This civ is very good at harassment and frontal assault, but due to its size of troop, it always struggles to protect a large number of siege weapons. But I really don’t have any good ideas to solve its problems without changing its original characteristics.
Maybe we can creat some new siege for it？
Or maybe we can try give OOTD with Black Rider as experiment?