I know it’s extremely controversial, but here’s my simple take: too much power creep, too many gifts for some kids, and an off-balance general meta.
A few small disclaimers: I don’t say this list is exhaustive, and I don’t claim it would create a perfect balance, but I see it as a clear step in the right direction. Moreover, I don’t really address water/naval play, nor do I claim this would balance the two last DLCs’ civs.
A small poll: Should there be a great nerf (this one or another)?
Yes
No
0voters
Now a list of proposed nerfs:
General:
Fire Lancer (base only): -1 attack, -5 HP (to 8, 60)
Champi (all stages): -1 armour infantry class
Swordsman-line (excluding Militia), all infantry Castle unique units (including Throwing Axeman, etc.): get 0 attack bonus vs infantry. This effectively allows to get bonus damage vs all Infantry with negative armour class (e.g. Champi, see above).
Not diving in the details, but Siege ships should be more even. In particular the Cannon Galleon, which requires Chemistry to unlock, is getting bullied by other civs. In particular, the Lou Chuan is really too good against buildings, even when considering its cost.
Civilisations:
Celts: Lose the last archer armour upgrade.
Chinese: I’m sad to say, but: Tech discount -5/10/15% (Feudal/Castle/Imp) → -5/10/10%
Hindustanis: Ghulam (regular/elite): get -2/-1 infantry armour class. (Maybe also change villagers discount to -10/-10/-20/-20%.)
Incas: Since they received Settlements, maybe their Food discount could be toned down?
Vietnamese: Lose “Eco upgrades are researched 100% faster”. If this is too brutal, the figure could be nerfed to 50% faster. HP increase bonus should not affect Cavalry archers (unhistorical, overshadows Turks and they are just too good).
Wei: I don’t have enough experience, but the eco bonus with Villagers seems too good, and Tiger cav are OP. Their unique ability is too strong AND their base stats are insane too…
As you can see, some of these changes are undoing unnecessary, out of “traditional playstyle” past buffs.
The issue is cannon galleons being one-dimensional, being useless before winning on the water, and nowhere providing the same power spike and versatility as bombard cannons, hand cannoneers, or even bombard towers.
The siege ships are really mostly there to destroy shoreline structures and makes you regret thinking you can turtle behind a line of castles and towers.
One of the few changes here I actually think would be good for the game. Most of the others would either kill the civ (or a unit), or undo the changes they received to help them keep up with power creep.
Already was toned down when they received settlements. Lost 5% in all ages.
Game balance overall is pretty good. There are some issues that can be addressed, but there will always be issues when you have assymetric civs.
I do like the idea of having a patch that generally makes most civs a little weaker instead of constantly buffing everyone.
I think one way of doing so would be to take some technologies away that are currently too common in my opinion like Squires, Arson, Husbandry, Heresy and potentially also Thumb Ring and Bloodlines. It would maybe also be worth a thought if Ballistics and Chemistry really need to be available to all civilisations.
Unlike removing the last Blacksmith upgrades those changes would impact the game in Feudal and Castle age already.
I don’t know about Chemistry, but Ballistics absolutely needs to be available to all civs. Ranged units are practically unusable during raiding without it.
It could be for a civ that has basically no usable ranged units anyway or in combination with something like Gunpowder units have Ballistics like the Portuguese bonus. But yeah it would be a massive change to do that with an existing civ.
As for Tiger Cavalry, they are only broken in castle age with promotions, I mean you can achieve something with 175 HP, 17 attack, 6 PA thats mobile and destroy any ranged unit….. thats just silly.
Good nerf would be reducing the HP increase of non-elite from 10 to 5, and reduce the base HP from 115 to 105, so you end up with 145 HP instead of 175 hp,far more balanced.
Chinese are better served by a nerf to their vill start to 2 vills and start with 50 food, 150 wood. This also nerfs their nomad start which will balance out the civ better.
There is an incentive for newbies since you can at least queue 1 villager and there is an incentive for pros who are more skilled can manage the drop off faster.
No. The devs tried that and no one liked it. The Chinese start is their identity; it’s polarizing, but I think it’s a crucial element of the civ that shouldn’t be changed.
One of the few changes here I actually think would be good for the game. Most of the others would either kill the civ (or a unit), or undo the changes they received to help them keep up with power creep.
Already was toned down when they received settlements. Lost 5% in all ages.
Game balance overall is pretty good. There are some issues that can be addressed, but there will always be issues when you have assymetric civs.
Fair enough for Incas, I can it out; but overall I don’t understand the opposition, when I almost only target the most powerful civs (sometimes unfairly so), such as Chinese, Vietnamese, Hindustanis, etc.
That’s indeed another way to go I’m not opposed to, but I’d rather tweak and tone down some bonus as a start… Maybe for e.g. Chinese I’d agree playing with Tech Tree is a better idea, especially when this can add historical significance (it is my suggestion for Khmer).
Disagreed. They already tried before and everyone was against it for good reasons.
But that just condemns us to see the power creep going on endlessly…
I recall that the official reason for giving the Malays “Infantry armour upgrades are free” was that “the other civilisations in the same DLC have more bonuses”.
To sell the game in Vietnam, with little success.
I don’t think they’re particularly strong; it’s just that they’re never bad. And if Player A thinks they’re stronger than Player B, they just want to avoid a civ-loss situation