It’d be interesting to see where Italy would sit with just the following additions:
Ranged Infantry Combat (age 3 +15% attack/hp)
Economic Theory
Infinite 7 Vet Bergs (age 3)
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Add a vill to those suggestions either with lombard age up or a starting vill and they’d definitely move up towards a 50% win rate.
3 Likes
and maybe have the church train time tech affect the papal units? just give them some lategame way to push them out a bit quicker?
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Or add a new “Papal Army” tech for like -20% train time for like 350c
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something along those lines, yeah. add to an existing tech or add an extra one at the basilica
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I had some ideas as well.
Current Ideas provided:
Improved Papal army train times ( I like this idea since it buffs Italy at all stages of the game)
Extra Starting Villager (this is always good. It would give them a stronger age 1 than even germany)
Ranged Infantry Combat (I like this idea too but id be more interested in something that ‘smooths’ Italys gameplay)
Economic Theory age 1 (this would compete with 2 already really good economy cards age 1. Capitalism+faster age up)
Inf. 7 Vet Berg card age 3 (Guard Vets? This idea could work but I dont like the idea of sending to get just 7 vet skirm. I dont see this really improving much tbh unless its extended age 3 and even then I dont think itd be sustainable.)
Impoved Papal Armies (This would improve Italy at all stages of the game, while bombard/Halb does need a buff I think faster training times would be more beneficial.
Buffs to Pavs (This would improve italy age 2 to early age 4. This would be good)
Infinite Resource Lombard Cards (Improve Italy all game)
Update Church Techs (HC Card, Improve Italy Midgame depending on Tech changes)
I think a lot of Italy’s design is counter intiutive. You want to build pavs but as soon as you hit age 4 you want to tech out of them.
They have Lombards that are suppose to help them with their economy but they do not really offer much economic benefit outside of a few resource cards but you lose a factory late game as a result.
They receive strong Papal units BUT must share a que with homecity shipments. Of course you get them through a building that…Generates exp which gives you more homecity shipments.
I personally like idea of Infinite Resource cards for Lombards (buff for Italy all game)
Combine usury and Advanced Lombards into one card (This would be a huge economic boost to Italy lategame from one card. Their yields suddenly are positive and faster. Combined with Inf. Resource cards this could be very very strong lategame. MAYBE make up for a lost factory).
Buffed Pavs (improve Italy early)
Buffed Papal times (this would improve Italy at all stages of the game)
Thoughts? Hopefully the Community can unite around a few ideas to help drive the developers into a decision making process on how to proceed.
3 Likes
The Basilica is all around convoluted nonsense so a rework to that could be an avenue to buff Italy. Make the Papal units natives so you can have a bigger army. Add a Papal Basilica holy site with Papal Zouaves and Papal Guards as native units. Then set up the Basilica to train these as armies paired with units that cost population.
Swiss Guard
3 Papal Guards & 3 Swiss Pikemen
Noble Guard
4 Papal Zouaves & 2 Elmetti
Palatine Guard
4 Papal Zouaves & 1 Papal Bombard
Other Changes
Take Schiavone out of the Basilica because they have nothing to do with the Church. Put them in the Lombard, Fort, or even rework them into a cavalry unit.
Ditch Papal Lancers in favour of Elmetti. They are the same thing, with both being based on Lancia (An Elmetto is the head of a Lancia company, and the Papal army only briefly experimented with Lancia). The regular Elmetto could upgrade to Papal Elmetto with a charged attack if Papal Arsenal is sent.
Papal Bombards also are a made up unit. They could be simplified to something more like “Bronze Bombard” and only get the name Papal Bombard if Papal Arsenal is sent.
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I generally agree with the concept but am concerned about just making them nats cause:
-the combat stats of these units should not be 0 pop ever. Ever ever. 0 pop elemeti bad idea in age2 or ever. And elemeti are fine as is so either keep it paypal lancer with much reduced stats or keep pop. These things rock its how slow they come out thats an issue and tbh no one says these are weak its general problems with italy holding them back not “need more mobas aura super units”. Also just imagine france with these. Think of 5x carded elemeti with auras around cuirs. I like thr idea of keeping it church centric but it would need alot of work i fear to make it balanced.
-overpop is a treaty thing anyways in 1v1 pop is a major factor. Italy treaty issues are tied to eco moreso than anything cause zouaves are actually broken as hell but your eco and slow mass are the only thing hold them back.
Thr smart alec in me thinks people want to have sipahi trainable for every faction, but to be serious making these easy and op as hell makes italy broken in supremecy and solves 0 issues in treaty. Lets not lean into more broken stuff in aoe3 albeit there is a part of me that realizes the s in our rts game is often nit popular amongst players.
Make them more accessible first. Again 45s base send time is actually pretty good. A paypal/zuoave mix shipment in age3 or 4 is also huge. The truth is for treaty devs need to just give the 2nd factory and i dunno lock it behind 2k wood or w/e to not effect supremacy if they scared of balance here.
And fix the blingbard ye its just a bad great bombard. Bad bard.
Anyways thats how you get nerfed into the ground after the entire community gets tired of your shit. Small changes, peices by peice create lasting interesting builds that last years and are beloved. Major changes should have major examinations for balance. Im just tired of fotm moba pops and there is alot of people the same. We can make the church units central and fun without making them obectively OP i think.
Read my post a bit more carefully before you freak out.
Yes, that’s insane and not at at all what I’m suggesting. I said only Papal Zouaves and Papal Guards should be natives. Then pair them in an army with regular mercenaries.
The Swiss Pikemen and Elmetti would be stock standard, regular mercenaries at least before Papal Arsenal is sent. There’s no way in hell they should get classed as natives or cost zero pop.
You wouldn’t be able to overpop with this. The armies would still cost as much population as the mercenaries they contain. For example, the Noble Army would cost 8 pop because it comes with 2 Elmetti. The Papal natives would also need a build limit so you can’t just kill off the mercs and keep the natives around for a massive army.
Obviously they can be rebalanced if they are a standard native unit. But your reply is so unhinged I’m not sure if you’re even talking about Papal Zouaves or the Zouave mercenary.
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Is not 2 elmeti and 4 zouaves now 8 pop instead of 16? Sure its not directly but its more or less the same result
Ig technically your not messing with pop for elemti, but it would be like making steppes 0 pop cause thx to banner system you would be effectively making keshigs or xbow 1/2 pop for example. These are things that have massive changes.
And yeah elemeti paypal guard and paypal zouves are solid units. Not 0 pop units at all. 7/4 max train per a batch every 60s down to 30s iirc post imp is the logjam. I dont think adding them as nats would solve things and would make them liable to be busted when balanced against 21 other civs. Imho. Again france with age2 5x carded charge attack aura halb and royal musk sounds problematic.
As for paypal zouave yeah speed 5 extra range high dps infanty (not hvy or light tag) with extra rr% and aura as is are busted as hell but limited to age4 and slow to mass. Removing these designed limitations without a nerf is likely to make them busted.
I thought it was obviously a given they would get rebalanced to be a native unit. You can’t just take a 2 pop unit and make it zero unless it’s gonna have an insanely high cost and low build limit.
They’re meant to have a meh army by design, they’re meant to be an economy based civ.
To buff them in ways that matter without changing their design
Papal units need to come out faster in late game
And I think mercenaries should have a way to become cheaper, or more available, (take advantage of the fact you can have multiple lombards and taverns) as opposed to just 1 tavern by default for most civs.
2 Likes
That was presumptive of me then. To my defence, ive lived through tatar spam, akan spam, conq spam, a few infinite and over limit sent native unit spams and several others so prehaps i was quick to put it out there. But yes assuming it was limited it could be balanced but again france is always lurking near any good native to waiting to make it busted
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But even if it were still as you mention, their army is not meh, it is quite bad and their economy cannot even be considered good, at least in late game, if not terrible and very bothered by the load of resources of the Lombards
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actually, what would be a fun thought experiment is : how much would taly’s eco be wroth in vills compared to other civs with 2 factories if italy also got a 2nd factory? liek vs feitorias ports, france with full eco, germans, mexico etc.
just curious IF they got 2x factories would it even be op?
No it wouldn’t be even the slightest bit op because they have nothing special with their eco, lombards only serve to send the cards that deposit resources or if you’re stacking 3k wood or something you can rebalance your macro a bit easier. They in no way replace a factory.
4 Likes
I will say this though, card space already is a bit tight - adding eco theory and a second factory would be a bit rough for deck space. You’d almost have to ditch the Lombard cards?
well isnt it like a marginal ROI on food/wood with ursury plus uffuzi makes it .2xp per a lombard when trickling so its worth something
I recently watched a video on the rate of lombards and usury card and usury is so worthless it takes ages to pay off even if you also send advanced lombard card and without it you’ll almost never cover the cost of shipping it, in fact almost any other card is better even like 1600f is better than usury. Also you’re only likely to be able to ship cards like advanced lombards and usury in treaty and in treaty italy are the worst civ in the game closely followed by malta iirc.
3 Likes
I propose the following changes for Italy. 
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The Roman Tactics card gives deflection ability to Pavisiers, Pikeman, and Halberdiers. (only between archaic units)
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Carabinieri technology sends 20 consular Carabinieri, allows you to train them in the stables, the Ranged cavalry get -10% ranged attack Rate of Fire and -10% train time.
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Risorgimento technology sends 20 Redshirts, 2 extra for each house in the game and allows them to be trained in urban centers.
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Investment shipments now also add a small amount of investment to each shipment. (250 of each resource if all investment cards are sent)
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Advanced Lombards and Usury are merged into a single card without being nerfed.
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Advanced politicians now also guarantee 2 shipments to the revolutions.
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House of Savoy stops being a team card, sends 5 Armored Pistoleers and allows them to be trained.
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Papacy technology now also improves the speed of papal shipments by 17%.
3 Likes