These Civs are overloaded and should be stripped from certain bonusses to make place for "good" new civs

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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First I know this is a controversial theme.
And I may sound arrogant by claiming this - and a lot of these civs are really “classic” civs that are beloved by people also because they are overloaded with bonusses.
And yes I intentionally be a bit arrogant here cause I want that topic to be discussed. Cause maybe someone has an idea to solve that legacy issue differently.

But we live in a world with 42 civs and a lot of the civs since DE came out have really awkward bonusses and techs. Cumans double TC, Flemish Revolution, Sicilians. Szlachta Privileges 2 new civs with no knights and no usable replacement.
I think we are at a state where some of the older civs need to be stripped of some of their bonusses to make them free for newer ones. Ofc it’s not always a good idea to just take away a bonus, sometimes civs need compensation for that.

Feel free to correct me or add your own civs that you feel have too many different bonusses which could be used to give new civs an identity without the need of adding gimmicky features which don’t really fit the game.

A) Franks. Franks have the best Palas (or at least one of the best). But they also have a good eco, one of the best knight rushes, super cheap castles and a UU that destroys the main counter of their cav. In my opinion Franks could be stripped of the berry bonus and potentially even the castle bonus in exchange for making their cav even stronger, re-establishing the franks cav superiority from before.

B) Mayans. Mayans have the chepest Archers, a super strong eco (on open maps), Super Eagles, a super strong UU and even cheaper walls. I think there are multiple ways to adress them. One way would be to change their eco, one other to take away the super eagles or a third could also be to make their archers cost standard and give that bonus to a new archer civ.

C) Berbers. Berbers have Super Cheap Cav and Camels. But they also have Camel Archers and the Genitour. First the Genitour shouldn’t belong to Berbers in the first place. ANd they don’t even need it. Second with the Camel Archers + Kasbah they don’t need cheaper Camels aswell… The cheaper knights are enough. In the exchange I would probably buff their scrush by reducing their cost by 10 % in feudal.

D) Mongols. Mongols have a super scrush, really strong CA (UU) and ferrari siege. I think the ferrari siege is a bit too much here. Imo if they just have solid FU siege they are already a very strong lategame civ. The UT could instead do something with the SL to give an alternative to the CA play and make the civ less one-dimensional therefore.

E) Malians. It’s actually only about their longer lasting gold they received. Imo they should instead get something for their infantry directly. This bonus is actually better for a versatile civ that doesn’t plays infantry as a main option like byzantines, gurjaras, Saracens…

Now feel free to trash me. Mabe I deserve it for being so arrogant to claim this . But it’s just my honest opinion, even on a more “meta” level. I think these civs being so overloaded with bonusses from that legacy make it really hard to create new civs that aren’t “gimmicky”. Not only because they “occupy” these bonusses…

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Are you sure you’re not meaning synergy rather than having too many bonuses? You just listed one civ with 4 bonuses, and everything else has only 3 bonuses (Berbers only have two on land maps). Then you go 180° and ask for Malians to start stacking bonuses on infantry?

In more details:

A) Removing the berry bonus is probably the only thing most people will agree here. The devs aren’t removing the castle bonus anyway because that would leave them with just two bonuses and they gave detinets to the Slavs because they were the only no bracer civ with no defensive bonus/UT whatsoever. Regarding cav domination what about chivalry?

B) I get it Mayans are super good but they only have three civ bonuses and very narrow options. There is room for nerfing but not for removing whole bonuses/UT.

C) They have a better tech tree but an even lower amount of bonuses for most maps. The discussion about genitour/camel archer overlap has been done quiet a lot, tbh I don’t think it’s this bad. Genitours are much better against foot archers, don’t require a castle (unlike camel archer) and don’t require an upgrade in castle age (unlike elite skirm). And I’m not sure how having camel archers (kasbah doesn’t count since their training time already takes it into account) should mean they don’t have the right to cheaper camels?

D) Hold on how is nerfing their siege in favour of SL going to make them less one dimentional? They now are a CA+ light cav meatshield civ only. That’s also doing it quite dirty for the other SL civs, as not only the Mongols have the best free bonus for them but now they would have something else to make up for no last armour.

E) The Malians’ trash isn’t exactly good, they don’t need to lose their gold bonus especially not in favour of Byz (trash bonus) or Saracens (market bonus). Ig you mention Gurjaras because of the whole “too many gimmicks” deal but it’s obviously not replacing the food bonuses which are the gimmick ones, so I don’t see the point either.

It would help to tell what civs are affected by this. All I can think of in term of bonuses are: the folwark, cuz all the farming bonuses were taken, the Bengali vill spawn, because all the villager bonuses were taken, and that’s it. I don’t think the Gurjaras are gimmicky due to a lack of available bonuses, they could have just given them berries that last much longer and call it a day.

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I used the word overloaded and tried to explain in my text what I mean with it. It’s just that I think these civs don’t need all these bonusses and it would make more sense in the wider context of the game to remove these bonusses from the civs and give them to other (new) civs.
The civs have already a strong Identity and having some of these extra bonusses is just too much. It was fine when the game didn’t had that many civs like now, but with the 42 civs we have now having these civs with strong identity and extra bonusses makes it really awkward to design new civs. You have basically no choice but to make the new civs gimmicky.

Thats also what i mean when I talked about giving the gold bonus to another versatile civ. I didn’t meant these civs specifically (though after thinking now I could imagine incase with longer lasting gold actually). I just think it doesn’t fits malians cause malians final “strike” is infantry. I think the bonus should probably given to a civ that has more gold intensive units. I like malians and I think the change was just not well targeted, cause it leads to more farimba cav play and makes their infantry even more situational. Which I think is a pity.

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I’m open for this idea, some civs can indeed use a makeover.

I agree.

Disagree.
So you want to make them even more a themed park of just- Knights?
Definitely need to get rid of the Berries bonus though.

Changing current civs for the sake of possible new civs is a bad approach in my opinion, the priority should always be on the current civs we have, new civs matter less, plus there’re enough ideas that’re waiting to be implemented.

I AGREE, this unit makes no sense in the current Berberian tech tree.

I dont understand this one though, we’re talking about a civ that lacks both an eco bonus, Paladin and a Halb tech. Discount on their Camels is intuitively right and highly balanced.
Also discount on their Scouts just make them too much of a Magyars, I dont understand this one.

You want to make Mongols just another Tatars.
Mongols are nicely designed, having Ferrari Siege yet no Halbs makes it much more interesting, the civ doesnt have FU Cavalry nor Arbalester, so you’re left with just Mangudai.
SL are one of the worst unit designs and should be addressed seperately. Anyways, Mongols shouldn’t be an over-the-top SL civ. It’s too similar to the other civs.

We have to go more artistic and less conceptually-trapped by a theme.
Best Siege in the game yet no Halbs pretty much nails it.

I AGREE.
Horrible bonus, especially for Malians who have a top 5 Post-Post-Imp (no gold era) with one of the best low gold compositions (Farimba Light Cav and Champskurls), why did they make them even stronger in that niche situation. No idea.

Theme park again?
They already have the most viable Longsword in the game, period. Why would they need another bonus?

Besides this new bonus developers gave Malians, they’re nicely designed.

You dont deserve any trash talk.

I do appreciate your concert about this game being inflated with gimmicks, we really needed this post!, I support your line of thought recognizing the problem and bringing it to a discussion.
But cant say I’m okay with the solution you offer. You systematically shallowed down the civs and narrowed each one of them into a single idea rather than their current (more of an) abstract artistic form which isn’t over-rationalized.

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Taking into account future civs kinda makes the whole deal a whole lot harder. Like, is there a need to free up the Berber’s camel discount if a new camel civ isn’t even guaranteed (and after DoI I think they will make other kind of civs). Then there is the question of bonus replacements , in some cases it’s not an issue but what happens when it’s needed (ie. giving one civ UT to a new one)? Wouldn’t you just change what civ is gimmicky? Then there is the fact that “gimmicky” isn’t quite defined here.

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I’m sure there will be new camel civs assuming we are on course for a large number of cash cow expansions.

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Franks dont need to become even more one dimensional. The only thing they do well is knights, and along the castle is the only unique thing they have

Im fine with them losing an eco bonus but I prefer to keep and buff the berry bonus over the farm one since scouts without early age up are pretty rubbish and the farm bonus is what makes it so good for casuals imo

Im fine with the mounted skirm being moved somewhere else (BUT NOT TO IBERIA PLEASE), but changing the camel thing seems both unnecesary and a bad idea. Good camels is an important part of the civ identity abd removimg them is dumb

THeir late game only have mediocre hussars and cav archers by late game, they need the ferrari siege

Malians are already good enough at doing champions. At best give them an spear bonus

And the gold bonus is to make their late game less trash now that their early game is just mediocre

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You mean expansions where civs can garrison cows like the Gurjaras, but that generate gold? I love it!
(I’m being flippant of course, I know what you mean).

The whole premise of modifying existing civs for anything other than balance/flavor or to improve the player experience is odd to me. I’d rather the devs try to make creative new ways of giving new civs bonuses. Recycling old civ bonuses just seems like both the laziest and the most disruptive way of going about it. Also, I’m not for any kind of artificial limit, but there will probably come a point where there’s a saturation point in terms of adding new units/bonuses/mechanics. Even so, I think we’re about 15+ civs out from that happening.

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I think stuff like Franks and Mayans could do with some reworking/deductions but don’t fully agree on the rest

Especially not camel discount for berbers as it’s definitely not an overlap. maybe somehow they could get the staggered discount in feudal but not sure how that could happen without it being a straight buff.

As mentioned above genitours are somewhat of an eco bonus(don’t need e skirm upgrade), but I don’t think they should be locked into Berbers either due to partial overlap.

By keeping the genitour locked into Berbers we hardly see it used, whereas if it became a regional unit, civs that don’t have camel archers would more likely use it, so I like the idea

Definitely agree with tungstenboar, bonus for pikes not for champs. They are already the militia line with the highest odds of being useful . That being said they’re a very diverse civ that if anything needs some kind of tweaking to encourage their diverse unit advantages

For me it’s the mangudai, they’re too good and cover too many bases too well(killing siege too well) It’s like the Sicilian cavalier, but accepted purely because they’ve been around so long

Same logic for Mayans getting too much only because that’s the way it’s always been. Devs completely over estimated the cost of gold, and the strength of gunpowder

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No. But they have that classic “knight civ” image. With this in mind it’s hard to justify bonusses that make other strategies also top for them. And their super cheap castles are definetely one thing that should be questioned if it’s really not better with another civ.
Another civ that is designed around using it’s UU like… Bengalis for example.

I’m realistic enough to know that this is wish-thinking. If we don’t remove the bonusses preemptively no dev will even come to the idea to make a total overhaul in one dlc. Everybody knows what would happen then.
Moving the malians bonus to bohemians was acceptable cause malians never had a like super big fanbase and the change made was not that big of a deal.

I don’t think so. Their Hussars are actually kinda strong, especially with the mangudai behind. They are different but I wouldn’t call them mediocre.
I don’t think mongols need the ferrari siege. Even without it they would have one of the best lategames bec of the mangudai + hussar.

The thing is for me it’s jsut too much that they have one of the best knight rushes (if not the best) paired with camels which even counter other civs knight rushes. One of it at a time is good, but both is again too much when we think about 42 civs and one civ basically occupies the “best all-in castle knight play … ah and also best all-in camels play…”. And bec they already have the camel archer which is more “resistant” to camels than standard CA the camels play isn’t that important for the civ as the knight play.

Yeah exactly. I was a bit unspecific here also cause i’m not really sure how their infantry play could be improved. Maybe by giving the spear line 1 resistance to anti-spear damage or a tweak to the gbeto. Or even give back the farm discount so they have more food. It’s maybe not that easy to find the right tweak cause we also don’t want to make malians goths 2.0, do we?

Yeah the mangudai is the best Unit in the game. But one unit has to be the best. I think that they counter all siege is a bit over the top. I’m not a friend of any ranged units killing rams. Imo rams are exactly made to be immune to ranged fire. It would at least open up one unit to push the mongols.

Maybe we have to open the Hand Cannpners thread again 11

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Both units that are very weak vs ranged. Here is when siege becomes valuable. They need the good siege to keep the mobility and to keep them interesting

Without the good siege they are a lamer Tatars

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:thinking::thinking: The civ is defined by the power of mangudai. Drill is not used by Mongols on Arabia to counter archers. Their hussar mangudai combo is more than good enough to deal with this by raiding the guts out of the opponent. And there’s enough granularity between a fragile (to arrows) but higher dps Vs a lower dps sturdier army comp.

But I just remembered… Why do Mongols get siege engineers? Drill is literally the best UT for siege in the game and they still get FU siege? How does this make sense? If anything of all the civs that should lack SE, it’s a civ that gets Ferrari siege.

In comparison it’s like Sicilians getting paladins or malians getting blast furnace.

If your civ gets a bonus that removes the primary weakness of the unit, shouldn’t there be a trade off?

Same. And I think a while ago there was a long discussion on how trebs should have their armour class split so that mangudai couldn’t nuke them. Because that is also a big issue.

For me it’s more about the negative player experience even if balance is fine.

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If I remember, during very early forgotten development Mangudai were almost changed to only have a bonus vs rams.

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Actually sotl made a video about mangudai today 11

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While I understand your point aren’t Hindus and gurj better with the all in camels? Maybe even Saracens with market abuse? Although the timing might be too short

I see it as Berbers are the best all in cavalry (generalist) play. The trade off is their feudal is average meaning you have a window to hit them/slow em down before they get to their power spike

I understand now. There’s still the issue of countering other camel civs then. With minimal general eco bonus, mediocre camels (if the discount is removed) and no halbs. Would that be enough to fight other buffed camels civs? Malian , gurj, Hindu , Saracen camels? I guess that’s the point of buffing their discount to feudal though

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Yeah just read that now. And then the change was reverted in African kingdoms

I need to watch that

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Is the Mongols history, and ofc Mangudai has a spot here.

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I don’t agree with quite some of the specifics (ie the civs) you provide but I do support the general argument. A lot of the old civs seem indeed a bit too stacked with fundamental bonuses (at least franks and mayans are examples I agree with). And it doesn’t even have to be for making space for bonuses for upcoming dlcs, even you could redistribute a bit with current civs.

Like the mayan longer lasting res could be split into several bonuses with applying to single res with higher percentage. Mayans could get the gold one malians currently have (which doesn’t really fit imo) or alternatively the stone one. Incas could get longer lasting farms, tartars already have the heardables, maybe something like magyars could get the hunt (although that’d make their opening even stronger) and so on.

Only problem I’d see with such redistribution efforts I see it might confuse people (especially those who aren’t following the game closely) but if it’s done moderately would be good imo.

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Can’t we have both? They nerfed the Aztec bonus production just fine without completely removing it because a bunch of civs have more specialized production bonuses/technologies.

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Why change it and instead save this new resource specific ones for new civs. Why constrain future prospects? Give the stone, hunt, berry, wood and fish versions. That’s 5 civ bonuses for 5 civs right there, 6 if you do fishing boats separately.