Somehow they make English the most un-inspired and the weakest faction of all

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
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Even I am the newbie, after 3 days test + I spent tons of time on the English. I can’t even get myself to play them like how do they mistake between making straightforward faction for friendly purpose to making it the most un-inspired , too basic nd the weakest atm

AGAIN, I understand the purpose of vanilla faction like the English is to learn all of the base mechanics of the game while not dealing with specific playstyles or strong strengths and weaknesses from design perspective. That also mean you are not letting players explore the game foundation, as understanding the Civil. Like the eng can teach you all of the basic, that really you can learn it from TUTORIAL and play match with AI/ watching youtube content. The English lessons not gonna help much when you jump into Abbasid with only 2 landmarks , unique influential bonus system, or Chinese with bunch of Dynasty upgrade etc

What I am saying, they should make up a tutorial/vanila faction to teach newbie as that is what they want. They make English has a strong defense. So why not focus on that and make it a defensive faction so players can realize they can make a good Sacred or Wonder victory

Problem:
-The English has no unique units nor upgrade that stand out so they can’t compete with any others faction in Stress test at Mid and late game

-Their strategy reply heavily on Council Hall long bow rush which is easily countered by Outpost put nearby resource place. Outpost is cheap and effective vs range, they deal like 1 damage to it. You can go the late game, but if you meet player with the same skills you just most likely gonna lose vs others faction as you have nothing unique to surprise or compete against others

-People argue the reduction on farm can help them late game, but if you get to late game you lose anyway. Early you want to do a longbow rush to damage them as possible and with farm even at reduction cost, mess with your plan

Compare to others faction:
-The Chinese is hard to play, has weak early game but their 3 and 4 Age has one of the best units like Siege Bee-net, archer and unique knights depend on situation

-HRE-Insane Infantry and can play rush as well, they will exploit and potential match vs Abbasid as they have all armor upgrade on infantry to help against their arrow bonus

-Abbasid- Economic boom beast of Civil, the -50% food on Civil meaning their TC, their economy will always outmatch you. They have both insane upgrade on everything and their units are mainly cavalry which are expensive but a good late game unit. If that is not enough, their Camel archer both can anti Spearman who is anti-cavalry and cavalry on top they have Camel Rider

Why not try to add unique units, upgrade for them? It does not complicated thing since their gameplay is straightforward and friendly enough

-Make their castle stronger, couple castles unique upgrade as that is what they are famous for
-Unique footmen knights, another one of their specialties
-Warwolf- where is my big Trebuchet bud

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The obsession with people writing misguided essays about the English civ on this forum cracks me up.

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With English, if you want to poke with longbows early, fine, but their best play imo is to focus on a 2 TC boom into castle age and then push. They are one of the safest civs to boom with, partially due to attack value of villagers, auto +25% attack speed bonus vs invaders, and then longbows on defense. All you have to do is make some infantry or horses to deal with rams as well. They have amazing landmarks, can build units out of their keeps, the network of castles bonus and yes, longer the game goes, better their farm advantages (gold income, increased gather rates) start to matter.
But really the game hasn’t released yet so it’s also waaay to early to come to any definite conclusions on balance.

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They cant go 2 TC vs any faction

They lose mid to late vs all the faction so far

But ofc, with people like you who don’t even understand the ENG lacks of any unique upgrades or strong unit to deal with others faction

The 50% reduction on FARM MEAN ABSOlUTElY NOTHING, they can’t boom like the Abbasid

They can’t have good gold income like HRE or the Chinese, that is just on economic point, The 50% reduction farm interference with their early longbow rush which is a must

If you go 2TC vs any of others faction, you can’t outsource them as you have nothing against them

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The English seems like a pretty good allrounder civ.
They get gold trickle from farms later on too, totaling in 136 gold/min. when 8 farms are being worked at around 1 mill. That is a pretty good trickle, better than housing a relic. The HRE need to secure a relic to get their 300 gold/min. or else they have built an entirely useless landmark.

Their MAA have a unique upgrade, making their armor superior.

Castles, towers and units get a 25% attack speed boost when fighting in a “network of castles” I find that to be quite substantial. It even gets to 50% if the upgrade is researched.

The berkshire palace even has 50% increased range.

I don’t know, it seems pretty nice overall, I think the English are not really underpowered or uninspired personally.

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Did you even check their tech tree?

Their MAA line is the best atm.

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I played mainly as the english during closed beta and stress test and they are pretty solid.
They have the ability to dictate the pace at the game because of the potential of their longbow rush, which is not meant to kill the enemy but to be used for map control and harass and weaken your oponents eco while you grow your own eco behind that.
They can get a second early tc on feudal like any civ and one of their landmarks for castle age is a town center, so as long as you research the proper upgrades your eco can be great.

Their farms can get a gold trickle late game from each farm they make and its pretty solid, I had no problems on keeping unit production late game with that tech. In fact it’s way better than the Chinese bonus late game as tax collectors work well on paper but atm they don’t seem that impactfull.

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Give the video that mean nothing

The MAA line of English is inferior vs HRE, not only that HRE has the best defense in the game with the upgrade % damage less on the building

Their cavalry sucks , they reply on mostly Infantry and longbow making they are the worst versatile civil ever in mid to late game, the Abbasid and HRE gonna shrek them with their camel speed and insane infantry

The chinese insane Siege units like Bee net that shrek through any armor units , the MAA without speed upgrade like the HRE gonna be a burden

The farm cost reduction mean absolutely nothing, it’s good on paper but the pay off is not big like Abbasid 50% food reduction, or HRE Relic bonus

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It’s absolutely laughable that noobs like you come here complaining about balance. Astounding level of ignorance. Who the hell do you think you are? You lose because you suck.

Compare your post to the post by the top five players, which say england is"waaaaay too op", to qoute HuT.

Im not top 5 but I had high enough MMR to be regularly matched against top players, and I too believe england is quite strong. Certainly not the weakest.

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Great way to start this conversation. You’re basically telling me you will not bother to even look at evidence people bring to the table.

It doesn’t, its average.

You do know that the Nest of Bees were nerfed to hell in the latest patch right?
Did you even play the stress test?

Abbasids don’t have insane infantry. They have like 1 tech that increases spearman range.
Its also funny that you think Abbasid cavalry archers can beat the English considering that archers are a notably good counter to them. Who has the best archers in the game rn?

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The English aren’t the most unique faction (by looks) as they’re just typical Europeans. Yet, they’re gameplay mechanics are fun and sometimes even overpowered. They aren’t bad, they can be surprisingly good. They get MAA in the Dark Age and possibly the best archers in-game. Their siege sucks, but their defenses are real good. Overall I’d say they’re above average. Not creative? Kinda. Powerful? Yeah.

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It doesn’t really suck. They have a pretty good tech for trebuchets for example (gives them aoe dmg). And they also have the Ribaldequin (anti infantry/mass).
image

The only thing they lack in siege is the culverin.

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Without culverin, they have a big disadvantage in anti-siege weapons at long range, so they have to depend on mediocre cavalry. There are counters, but it’s significantly harder. Once the game is out for a few weeks I’m sure people will find away to make them extremely powerful, like they will with all civs culverin or not.

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The springald is still a very viable counter to siege however. (comes way earlier than imperial age)
Sure without the culverin they lack long range counters to siege but that’s just how the balance is rn.
I wouldn’t say they’re severely deficient in that department.

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It’s becoming an unofficial feature of the game.

“Drop by our official forums to discuss balance, get tips on your play, and discover the true depths of ahistorical outrage that lives on the internet!”

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Great way to start conversation, nice appeal to authority

This is a good way to earn a block, you are not even worth my time

Great way to twist my words

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Another ad hominem aoe player

great, reason why aoe has 0 new players because of the “expert” who have think they completely understand how the game works and doing ■■■■ like this

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hahahah

You literally refuse to have a conversation about this at all.
Complete troll.

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I don’t think I’ve ever seen this much passive aggressiveness in one thread. Maybe the first English one with that guy who hates English was, but this is up there.

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I simply can’t remember, but aren’t camel archers a support unit for infantry and give bonus armor ?

So abbasids infantry have +1 range (spear), bonus armor if one has a support camel, they can build mangonals on the field (which helps them to instantly build an archer counter while staying offensive)

Doesn’t sound too bad to me.