The future of Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition

[MUTYLATOR5553]

On this topic, I’d like all of us players to talk about the future of Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition. Below I will present my specific proposals for Europe (because I know it best) and approximate concepts for the rest of the world.

I invite everyone to read and discuss

Europe

With the release of Knights of the Mediterranean DLC for AoE 3 DE, 17 years after the classic AoE 3 premiere, this game finally features European maps and European Minor Nations. Finally the game is not based on colonial themes, but presents civilization and history in a general way. I think future DLCs and updates about Europe should also focus on minimizing the colonial theme in European civs.

Home City Cards

Inspired by @vanBladdeck topic

The easiest way to spice up European civs is to add some Home City Cards as default European content. In this way, European civs will be more interesting, and in place of the old Cards, completely new, cooler Home City Cards could appear. Some HC Cards could be combined into one Card. This way you could add brand new HC Cards for each civ making them more asymmetric and original.

These two HC Cards could be incorporated by default into the Livestock Pen. What is what, but the lack of a cow training is terrible, and a special card that allows it is, for me, unnecessary cutting down the content of the Livestock Pen and littering the deck of cards. In addition, it would be nice to see other animals, such as pigs and poultry (chickens, geese, ducks).

Livestock Pen of Dreams

These two cards could be combined and added to the Capitol.

This card should be in the Tavern by default

I don’t know what to think about this card. Maybe it should be exclusive for the British civ?

The two cards should be combined into one and remain as the Home City Card.

HC Factory Card can be sent an INFINITE amount of times. The first shipment is free but the second and every subsequent shipment costs 1,000 coin.

These HC Cards could be added to the Trading Post located on the Minor Nations.

HC Fort Card can be sent an INFINITE amount of times. The first shipment is free but the second and every subsequent shipment costs 1,000 coin.

This HC Card would be removed. By default, a surgeon would be a trainable unit in the Church.

New types of Home City Cards

1. Brand new building (Wagon of building) in shipment:

• School - a building that generates XP and slowly researches random Technology. There you can train a Scientist (limit of 3 units) who can build Roads (increasing the speed of units), Bridges (possible to build on rivers) and Wells (increasing the efficiency of Mills, Estates and Livestock Pen).

2. X Company - Similarly to Italians, civ sends a company consisting of units based on a given nationality, e.g. Greeks, Scots or French.

Hero

The alternate Explorer skin has its own icon and name. Thus, the European Hero easily ceases to be an Explorer but still has its qualities - a trivial option for European Civs to get more continental content at a low cost.

Home City customization

More customizations possible for old European civs like special animations with rulers walking around the city, festivals and military parades.

Revolutions

• European revolutions available only on European maps (and the same with other continents). This way you can add more options for a revolution, e.g. Belgium, Norway, Bulgaria or Greece.

• Unique revolutionary Home Cities.

• OPTIONAL - Removal of revolution options that already have their civs (USA, Mexico).

Architecture

The imperial age changes the appearance of all buildings.

Brand new architecture styles (only civs already in the game will be listed):

1. Italian - Italians, Maltese
2. Central European - Germans
3. Eastern European - Russians
4. Ottoman (unique to the Ottoman civ)

Architecture styles already in the game (only civs already in the game will be listed:

1. West European - British, French, Dutch + USA
2. North European (the current Eastern European) - Swedes
3. Iberian (the current Mediterranean) - Spaniards, Portuguese + Mexicans

More content

More new maps:

Western Europe

1. Scottish Highlands
2. Brittany
3. Normandy
4. Burgundy
5. Provence
6. Zuiderzee
7. Friesland
8. Alsace–Lorraine
9. Hanover
10. Mecklenburg
11. Schleswig-Holstein
12. Brandenburg
13. Lower Silesia
14. Upper Silesia
15. Bavaria
16. West Prussia
17. East Prussia
18. Moravia
19. Slovakia
20. Austria
21. Styria
22. Tyrol

Southern Europe

1. Andalusia
2. Basque Country (greater region)
3. Aragon
4. Padania
5. Sicily
6. Tuscany
7. Venezia
8. Campania
9. Carniola
10. Croatia
11. Dalmatia
12. Dubrovnik
13. Bosnia
14. Serbia
15. Montenegro
16. Macedonia
17. Albania
18. Thessaly
19. Peloponnese
20. Crete
21. Thrace
22. Dobruja
23. Bosporus

Northern Europe

1. Gotland
2. Fjords
3. Lapland
4. Estonia
5. Karelia
6. Ingria

Eastern Europe

1. Greater Poland
2. Lesser Poland
3. Mazovia
4. Polesia
5. Red Ruthenia
6. Moldavia
7. Yedisan
8. Wild Fields
9. Crimea Peninsula
10. North Russia
11. South Russia
12. Ural

More new Royal Houses

1. House of Ascania - Anhalt, Saxony, Brandenburg, Saxony-Lauenburg, Lüneburg
2. House of Nassau - Netherlands, England, Scotland, Luxembourg, Orania, Nassau
3. House of Luxembourg - Holy Roman Empire, Austria, Bohemia, Hungary, Croatia, France, Luxembourg
4. House of Rurik - Ruthenia, Russia
5. House of Romanov - Russian Empire
6. House of Stuart - Scotland, England, Ireland, Great Britain
7. House of Medici - Italy
8. House of Savoy - Italy, Spain
9. House of Ottoman - Ottoman Empire (more focused on the European part of the Ottoman Empire)
10. House of Piast - Silesia
11. House of Borgia - Aragon, Papal State

With these 11 brand new Royal Houses, Europe would become Minor Nations complete.

3. More other stuff:

• New flora and fauna
• New treasures
• New Mercenaries and Outlaws

New DLC’s

Rulers of the Alps

New civs:

1. Austrians
   

   

2. Swiss
   

   

New Historical Battles:

1. Battle of Lepanto, 1571
2. Battle of Valmy, 1792
3. Battle of Waterloo, 1815
4. Battle of White Mountain, 1620
5. Battle of Vienna, 1683
6. Sacco di Roma, 1527

Kings of the Baltic Sea

New civs:

1. Danes
   

   

2. Prussians
   

   

New Historical Battles:

1. Battle of Gravelines, 1588
2. Battle of Königgrätz, 1866
3. Battle for Copenhagen, 1801
4. Battle of Mollwitz, 1741
5. Battle of Hohenfriedberg, 1745
6. Battle of Leuthen, 1757

Hetman’s of Wild Fields

New civs:

1. Poles
   

   

2. Ruthenians / or Ukrainians / or Cossacks
   

New Historical Battles:

1. Battle of Poltava, 1709
2. Battle of Borodino, 1812
3. Siege of Jasna Góra, 1655
4. Battle of Zhovti Vody, 1648
5. Siege of Zbarazh, 1649
6. Capture of Moscow, 1610

European campaigns DLC

New civ:

1. Sicilians
   
   

New campaigns:

Three campaigns telling the story of Circle of Ossus and their participation in the great European wars:

1. The Thirty Years’ War
2. Great Turkish War
3. Napoleonic Wars

[MUTYLATOR5553]

Africa

Minor Nations

10 brand new African Minor Nations:’

1. Fulani
2. Zulu
3. Pygmy
4. Moors
5. Swazi
6. Afrikaners
7. Ashanti
8. Malagasy
9. Maasai
10. Swahili

New maps

A lot of African maps.

New DLC’s

African Warriors

New civs:

1. Mutapa
   

2. Congolese
   

   

New Historical Battles:

6 brand new African Historical Battles

Merchants of the Sahara

New civs:

1. Moroccans
   

2. Kanem
   

   

New Historical Battles:

6 brand new African Historical Battles

[Konahrik1140]

@MUTYLATOR5553

European revolutions available only on European maps (and the same with other continents). This way you can add more options for a revolution, e.g. Belgium, Norway, Bulgaria or Greece.

¡NO!, This is the worst idea you could ask for revolutions.

[MUTYLATOR5553]

Asia

Minor Nations

A whole new type of Asian Minor Nations - Asian Communities. I think it should be the most numerous of all types of Minor Nations considering the cultural richness of Asia - the Middle East, Caucasus, India, Southeast Asia, Far East, Central Asia, Siberia etc. I think 3-4 Minor Nations from each of these Asian regions are the bare minimum.

The current Asian Minor Nations (Asian Holy Site) would become a universal Minor Nations that would play a complementary role to maps - which is already done by, for example, Jesuits and Sufis. New Holy Sites:

• Christian
• Islamic
• Buddhist
• Hindu
• Jewish
• and more

New maps

A lot of Asian maps with brand new Caucasus and Middle East maps

New DLC’s

Conquerors of the Far East

New civs:

1. Tatars
   

2. Koreans
   

   

New Historical Battles:

6 brand new Asian Historical Battles

Rajahs of the Southeast Asia

New civs:

1. Siamese
   

   

2. Vietnamese
   

   

3. Burmese
   

   

4. Dravidians
   

New Historical Battles:

6 brand new Asian Historical Battles

Sultans of Middle East

New civs:

1. Arabs
   

   

2. Persians
   

   

[AnyDiagram93675]

In fact, the developer’s suggestion is that the default Explorer model in all European civ should change from a card in the commercial age to a military commander to a general (the mounting and dismounting mechanism randomly produces weapons such as pistols, swords and spontoon which are equivalent to officers) to an automatic skin change in the imperial age For example, British generals, French generals, German generals, Italian generals, Spanish generals, Dutch generals, Swedish generals, Russian generals, Portuguese generals and Ottoman generals（Random walking, riding officers and flag of encouragement bring their own auras to all units. New energy accumulation attacks such as auras will be updated as recommended by the production team only in age 2 arrived age 5） all have different skins that conform to the characteristics of real history. It is very simple to promote the rank of officers to field marshal in commercial age

[dansil92]

i started reading, got to the infinite factory wagon, realized the whole post has to be satire or not worth reading after that.

[BonnyMountain91]

lmao forum posters do be thinking aoe3 is a total war game/ clash of clans or some ■■■■.

[Catalytic3351]

Long time lurker, first time poster (so flame away).

What I’m seeing here is someone who wants a lot of historically valid things, but isn’t really thinking about game play balance or strategy. Infinite factories, for example, would be unbelievably overpowered. The difference in power and flexibility between civs which have them and those that don’t is already considerable. Try playing Sioux/Lakota, Iroquois/Haud, or Aztec in a long post-imperial game. Your economy will struggle. You’ll run dry of wood, and that’s GG. Meanwhile your European civs all ship 2 and have the flexibility to get what they need when they need it. You can’t just keep throwing powerful buildings like that out with an infinite card.

The same principle applies to forts. Forts are really powerful buildings if used properly. You have to give up some major Age 5 power to get infinite forts with a revolution. That’s a good thing. The forts help offset the loss of those +50% att/hp cards and the +50% econ cards. You need the passive defenses to help even the odds. None of that needs to change.

The livestock card is another. Yes, they need a rework. Right now, there’s no incentive to use them. While they are powerful, no one wants to micromanage a late game economy. You don’t want to have to keep checking on your villagers and seeing if they’ve got a sheep/llama/cow to harvest or not. Haciendas + the Barbacoa card fixed that problem and made livestock usable. They automated it. That’s what needs to happen with the livestock pen. Then you balance around the number of villagers tasked (which generates more animals), the number of animals that can fatten, and the fattening rate. You’ve got a low output (sheep) and a high output (cow). If you want, you can add other animals with intermediate food counts and varying levels of potential food output. There’s a very strong historical argument for pigs because of the ubiquity of salt pork, for example, but we need a game play niche: probably cards to upgrade to higher outputs or change the various rates.

What makes this different from farming at the mills? Mills are consistent. Ranching is bursty. You get food when it fattens. So, it’s a supplement to farming, not a replacement. Ranching should be either an opt-in with a card, or a Revolution mechanic for creating the food economy for food-cost spammable swarm units (the cowboys, gauchos, revolutionaries, whatever the particular variant is).

The mercenary loyalty card is for your card decks. You send it if you’ve got a deck with a lot of merc cards. I use the Aztec equivalent which reduces the cost of Aztec support cards, for example. Since I’ve got 6+ of them, I get value out of it. If I only chose 1 or 2, I wouldn’t send the loyalty card. It’s an optional card and it works fine as is.

Taverns/Theaters/Saloons all need a balance pass. Outlaws struggle for an in-game niche. In most cases, they’re way too expensive in terms of population requirement, so no one uses them. If you do ever want to use them, typically, they give you the pop reduction card in Age 4 instead of Age 2 when it matters. Then there’s the issue of cross-over function between outlaws and mercs. Are they just two parallel copies of the same thing? Mercs are random whereas outlaws are defined by the map? The concept needs some attention. I’d like to use them more often, but mandatory cards, etc is the wrong way to do it.

I’d agree on the balloon card. Simplify and give me a reason to use it by just making it permanent.

Surgeons (and healers in general) aren’t widely used. Making them more accessible won’t change the root cause of that (they’re expensive, difficult to micro, take up population, often don’t heal in combat so you have to micro troops back to your base which is a lot of work for a slow heal. Late game, you just build new troops.) The field hospitals are fine mechanics with the AoE heal. You can train surgeons from there, which makes sense (vs the church). I don’t think any of this really needs an immediate change.

And there’s no reason to add a school building. Simple is good. If you want a tech, you buy it. You know what you want, you pay the cost for it. Random is bad in anything competitive.

Asking for HC customization updates is always a long shot. They take significant time to do the art. Are you planning on paying for a DLC so the artists get to eat after making all those new pixels? I’d like to see some updates as well as anyone, but aside from the Sioux/Lakota and Iroquois/Haud, I’m not jumping up and down over it. Same with your unique building art. Art costs money. The current art is fine. If they’ve got someone working some updates as a passion project, great! But there are higher priorities.

The other stuff is just long lists of names you want in the game without any argument for how they’d be implemented. We don’t need a bunch of copies of things that are already in the game. Simple is good. This game’s already much more complex than most RTSs.

[ScalierCactus96]

I like the card incorporation ideas. The buildings should have these cards in them. The rest of it is frankly to much work to read.

[constantine8775]

Infinite fort and factory can happen when I became king of the world- (i.e never)

[NikolieZeppilen]

Knew not to take this post seriously when the new map pool lacked Wales.

[Blast9867]

I wouldn’t have Cossacks and Sicilians be added because they’re already represented by the Russians and Maltese respectively. Now adding in more civs like the Danes, Estonians, Poles, and Swiss would be a good idea. We can also add in the Bohemians as well.

[Blast9867]

If Middle Eastern civs get added, I can definitely imagine the Ottomans architecture set being changed to the Middle Eastern set because the Ottomans are Middle Eastern and Turkish architecture is Middle Eastern style. Not to mention, the Ottomans also had sultans and it also ruled other parts of the Middle East besides just Asia minor.

[constantine8775]

I doubt it for two reason

1. Ottomans game play is centered around European gameplay- choose a politician to age up and have a “church” ( or rather mosque) and have a fort ect …
2. The Anatolia map-which they added recently-is a European map and it is heartland for Ottomans.

Ottoman Empire was a European power rather than Middle Eastern power.

[Blast9867]

But this doesn’t mean the Ottomans won’t be having the Middle Eastern building set. I mean think about it, the Ottoman Empire was ruling over the Levant and going as far as the Arabian Peninsula. The Ottomans can still function like a European civ and use the Middle Eastern building set. Looking at the United States and Mexicans, they both use European building sets (Western European and Mediterranean sets respectively) but take certain features from Native American civs like the walls as an example.

[MUTYLATOR5553]

@Blast9867

Estonians

They already represented by Swedes

[Blast9867]

Oops. Didn’t think about that. I probably joule of looked up more on the Swedish empire to inform myself about what territories it ruled over. Now I wonder if we could still at least add in the Bohemians and Lithuanians? Now if Lithuanians gets added, then they may represent the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth which the Poles can also represent as well.

[MatM1996]

It is very unlikely that they will put all that in… I doubt they will put in new historical battles (much less campaigns) and add more than 5 European maps… unless you think the game is going to have 5 years of uninterrupted content… nor does aoe 2 have that amount of content… being realistic they will put two new European civs (Poles and Danes), Middle East (Persia and Oman), Southeast Asia (Burma and Siam), South America (Mapuches and Tupies), South Africa (Kongo and Zulues) and already… they will not put more civs…

[MatM1996]

Of course, the Ottomans are a European civ (despite having their territory mostly in Asia and North Africa)… that’s what Ensemble Studios did and Forgotten Empires isn’t going to change it now…

[MatM1996]

The Bohemians are not going to be put in since they are represented by the German war wagons and the Lithuanians would already be represented in a possible civ of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth…