In fact, Ottoman currently no.6 on the list of underperforming civs. Although most top players agree, there is not consensus how to fix Ottoman. Furthermore, when we consider it’s the civ with only 47% win rate 1900+, problem is quite obvious. In fact, this is expected because Ottoman remains weak economy civ and requires extra population slot for skirmisher-unit (2 pop abus gunner). It also important to consider Jannisary known to underperform in hand combat against heavy cav. Azap is step in the right direction to allow more strategic variety and options, but cost is macro intensive (wood that is needed for ensuring sustainable economy) so it’s not the quite perfect solution. Overall these problems are quite easy to overlook in separation but severe alltogether, reasonable to say this.
So what can be done?
I propose two main fix for the Ottoman to conjunct with the two main problems. Like I stated, the two main problems is (1) economy fragility. In fact, this is both problems because weakness of unit (wood cost, 2 pop cost) is compounding of the economy fragility.
Therefore, I think quite reasonable to give Ottoman starts the game with a macro boost. Optimal solution is for wood income, since this is required to make sharp counter (azap) and the sustainable economy (wood upgrade for economical technology). Hence the correct solution it’s Ottoman start the game with a wood trickle.
The concept is not bad, civilization has always been to play risky with quality troops and at the same time bad economy, the use of the janissary is relative, in general to make exchanges against units, it is not a big deal, but it also has a very Positive as is the siege that for a double barracks rush for opponents who play greedy is very good, In addition, he has to suffer 3 shots from the TC with 10 garnished villagers for 1 to die.
There are still ways to play Ottomans that solve the economy, such as playing with the trade route taken with the Silk Road card, it will generate good economy, especially now that Azap is a unit that is currently very strong, most certainly that receives a nerf or adjustment, it only puts the route in wood input,
But anyway I understand your point, once the civilization loses mass or wants to make the macro change it is difficult because you cannot easily replace the troops that you have lost because of the economy which in a way is because of the low number of villagers but that generally happens at age 2 if at age 3 at early Tc it goes very well Ottomans
I think it could be fixed at age 2 with letters of considerable wood dribbling as India has.
on what metric is ottoman underperforming besides your very, to be blunt, incomplete 1900+ metric ? all data points to otto being overplayed as the only downside, with a small decreased from a almost 60% win rate last patch to this patch to something like 53%. in some civ matchups, otto demolishes other civs trivally (65%+)
You are also calling for azaps to be cheaper when the azap rush atm is one of the agreed broken strats by majority of playerbase. no way a better xbow/pike hybrid should be as cheap as a pike. hybrid units in any rts are hard to price but the general logic is always they must be cheaper than 2 of its soruce units but not less or same as one.
Also, pretty sure 1900+ data is absolutely terrible looking at it less than 200 games, some civ matchups have less than 5 games those are not even eyeball-able stats the chance that win rate is due to “error” aka not civ strength is quite literally magnitudes more likely than win rate is accurate. Otto also continues to be a 140 elo boost on avg, suggesting the win rate for ottomans is slightly deflated in fact. and i dont know who you are to even care about 1900 (telling us your in game name would probably be best here so people could follow your games and see what otto games are telling of this supposed boost) but ottoman have +50% on every single other elo bracket, and within civ matchups only loosing to other busted civs (usa, italy, azies) currently less than 47%.
In short the data in no way supports your argument, most people would argue the opposite that abus and now azap is still too good for its cost. Also, fwiw, an otto tc is worth a 2.3 -4.7 food a second trickle atm. for the same cost as other civs. Please show us some of your games so we can see where the otto eco, which isnt top tier, was not able to overcome another good civ via the safest ff into abus/jan or abus cav archer several times. As is , the data is actually quite against your argument statsistically.
53 at what level? Global accross all elos?
It was 57% 2 patches ago
Cureently it sits at 51%
Its also hard to use otto win rates as sole decider since otto inflates win rates. This is trickier to statistically compare, but knowing players jump 140pts on avg with otto by playing them that the true win rate would be before the civ carries them to higher elo ans they flatline at roughly 50%
The other thing too is civ grids, both free food party which does not hsve elo control’s and sunbros which does (type 1 and type 2 error prone respectively) cant control the sum of inter civ matchup so you often have to dig deeper. Otto looses hard to aztec and lakota but thosr make up less than 5% of their games
Basically win rates alone are insufficient and require further digging and applied knowledge especially at the high levels where aample size is small
in the most neutral and non confrontational manner possible, I’d like to remind everyone in this thread that otto was free-to-play for a little while so I think honestly we have to disregard the win % of pretty much anything under (probably about) 1000 elo for at least a little while here. higher elo than that its free game to draw conclusions from. Completely new players playing the trial free civ will obviously be pulling the win % down until they get stable in their elo and start to win games. Now that its off the freebies I expect we’ll see the win rate stabilize a bit higher than it is currently among low to average elo. I could be wrong too of course
I don’t care what is your skill and winrate data but I can sure you do not understand the game.
Otto is top tier civ plus various BO and abus is the strongest skirm type unit.
