IMO 3/4 of the new civs were OP in gimicky ways upon DE’s launch (the Tartars have never been OP) but now all three of the strong new civs had their g imicks taken away due to nerfs and now they’re a mixture of very weak/meh civs.
Steppe lancers were OP and also got overnerfed.
And I do think that Mongols are a very strong civ and if Steppe Lancers do get buffed then the Mongol steppe lancers shoud be the weakest of the 3 steppe lancers because Mongols are already strong enough.
I also think that Bulgarians is the best of the new civs and has some very strong points but overall they’re too 1 dimensional to be a good civ overall. And I think the Lithuanians are kind of similar to that but perhaps to less of an extent.
I know that on the one hand the new civs haven’t been played enough for us to realy know how strong they are.
But then again, on the other hand, pros are so quick to figure out the strengths and the new meta to a civ that I’d be surprised if any of the new civs were really that strong as I’m sure at least one pro would have figured them out already.
Here’s an idea; what if you could build a sort of ‘Steppe Scout’ in the Feudal age? That way rather than doing a scout rush, you could do a steppe scout and have a bigger step(pe) up when you upgrade them in the castle age.
That way they could still be technically inferior to Knights in terms of stats but still be worth building anyway.
The lancer would still need a little buff, maybe +1 damage and -.1 attack rate(faster attack), but at least that way they’d have a purpose for existing.
Cumans, Bulgarians and Liths are fine except for a few adjustments (tower shield, kipchak). I don’t have any solid opinion on Tatars. I think giving them free thumb ring is a good buff but it’s a pretty strong powerspike, and the imp UT needs a rework because it’s useless
They would auto-win as soon as they started making SL, just like Cuman.
The part they are 1 dimensional is that if you don’t m@a rush you don’t use your bonus. But since it’s very strong it doesn’t make them bad (it would be like saying that Franks = bad because they are all about cav rush) And then once you reach Castle age you can do a lot of different strats: knights, krepost+konnik, siege…
They have one of the broadest tech tree in the game…
Daut got a lot of milleage out of Bulgarians. Cumans see quite some play, Lithuanian as well. Tatars are left behind, but at least they are nowhere near pre buff Khmer/Viet level.
They are still the civ whose eco bonus can give them a 10 villagers lead, that can spam faster than Goths while having a good military tech tree, and the feudal siege workshop wasn’t touched at all besides bug fixes.
Overall I feel like these civs aren’t top priority
Yeah, 2nd tc in feudal is good, as long you’re not under pressure. I’m not saying they’re bad, but really, one of their bonus sometimes is good, sometimes not, and the other (feudal siege workshops) it’s 99% useless, since it’s really expensive to make it happen.
All in all, I really think tartars are the top priority right now. I would just buff SL, make silk armor affect them, and take away the mongol bonus for them. That would just fix everything
I wouldn’t quite go that far; It’s not like Goths where if you don’t drush you literally waste your Dark Age bonus - Bulgarians can still tech into Longswords in Castle against eagles, or 2H Swordsmen in Imp without any prior preparation, which isn’t bad. Being able to build mini castles is probably my favorite bonus of theirs and it makes it easier to mass their well-rounded UU.
But yeah, the only civ that seems to clearly need some help right now is Tatars, and even then I don’t know that they need a major overhaul.
imo if bulgarians face an archer race that also has eco buffs (say mayans) bulgaria are on a disadvantage… their ecobonus comes through infantry (which are really bad atm with the poor path finding/target priority)
and while their cav can kind of couner pikes/eagles… a mayan archer ball + ant cav will still rek high melee arm infantry and kill their knights on a per res basis. leaving siege, but since bulgarians have no eco bonus outside of indirectly through infantry, technically mayans will beat the siege through economy…
and imperial age bulgarian skirms are taking a big 2 extra damage vs eco boosted mayans (or equavelent) while gaining no eco bonus themselves
leading to a bulgarian player having to be quite a lot better player through virtue of faction imbalance
similaryl to ethiopia vs goths and so forth
aka bulgarians could still do with some work, ultimately all factions should be able to face off against all other factions equally (obviously an incredibly hard job to balance while still maintaining diversity)
and their team bonus is pretty stupid, its easily countered by just buildin a bleeding 2nd blacksmith, a whopping 150 wood… wow, as cactus hinted at, if you dont feudal rush with bulgaria you lose a lot of their “power” thats pretty sucky… even goths still maintain their main bonuses throughout…
I honestly think they should just concede that the Keshik is not a good unit and should be removed. They did get creative but it doesn’t really makes sense to have a unit like this which is similar to other units that you can make much faster from the stable. They should really buff the step lancer and make it the unique unit for the tatars. They should also make their unique tech apply to step lancers as well.
The step lancers should do really well if in a large group but now you have to produce them out of the castle so it’s much more difficult to mass them. I guess you could equate it to mangudai in that sense.
Their TCs cost half the stone, thus it’s easier to build multiple TCs to boom, and in Feudal you can build a defensive tower to defend against archers while still being able to lay a second TC as soon as you hit Castle without mining stone. And it synergizes very well with Kreposts. And lastly, the point of the free M@a upgrade is to make it very easy to attack the enemy with them before they get archers.
Technically then Mayan vs Mongols is a civ win as well, since Mongol Skirms are the same as Bulgarian and the Mongol eco bonus is Dark age only. Yes, Bulgarian have no Mangudai, but Konniks are good, they get Paladin and the single best Hussars in the game (while the Mongol one is weaker to arrows). And of course, they still have their good siege workshop. But in the end, the deal is that if we evaluate each civ according to their matchup vs god tier civs, then we will often end up disappointed.
Never thought about that one and it must be like Maya vs Goths, yeah. Fun fact: according to old aoe.stats data Ethiopian and Goths would have almost perfectly opposite victory windows 11 I guess it’s no longer the case…
Imo we are pretty close to that on land maps. However for water maps it’s a lost cause 11 (I mean I don’t think I’m really mistaken if I say Italians get a civ win on water vs like 30 other civs)
Still better than Incas 11 And frankly people don’t bother to build 2 blacksmisths… I find this bonus somewhat funny because in the beta in a 1v1 I randomed into Bulgarian and at some point we each had 1 m@a left and the faster blacksmith gave me the armor upgrade just in time to win instead of losing 11
Yes, it’s true, it makes the civ a one-trick pony for its dark/feudal transition. It doesn’t make them weak however because it allows you to abuse the fact m@a have no counter at that particular point of the game.
it wasnt about the skirm vs skirm match up,its that bulgarians have a non existent archer line, so have to rely on skirms or siege to shield them against archer civs(while i understand they can mass CA, most archer civs should be able to hard counter them, due to the lack of armour although they have parthian tactics, no eco and no archer bonuses), mongols have great archers (CA) and great siege
that’s true, i forgot about that, but then is also quite situational if you are already under pressure/implied earlier that bulgarians are not late game best so should rather be rushing/applying pressure as opposed to booming… but i guess it gives them options
but if another aggressive faction catches you while you’re trying to triple TC so early (the food drain for triple TC is tremendous)
because we’re now seeing goths in almost every single team game, these kind of hard coutners are occuring more often… mayans atleast have an eco bonus to assist them early and late game vs goths, as opposed to ethiopia
haha true! still doesnt mean its right, ultimately all these weaker things could be worked on if there was resources (i like pointing out atheism as well)
The Steppe Lancer should have its gold cost reduced back to 30. The unit needs to retain its quality of being weak in small numbers and powerful in larger swarms. If it’s at least easier to mass up than Knights, then I think its strengths can be applied more readily.
I actually agree on most things with you. Tatars need something more than just hill bonus (Arena tatars players)
But I still refuse to think that Mongol Steppe Lancer shouldn’t receive HP bonus. They don’t get the last armor upgrade so it kinda pays off on its own.
And YES PLEASE give Lithuanians last Infantry Armor Upgrade