Having a Castle Age counter unit that Is bad in Imperial Age js not very interesting to me. Also if they are not FU they are basically useless as counters to archers, and that does not feels interesting at all since it’s a key unit, and part of the rock-paper-scissor triangle.
I’m fine with like monks not having a Imperial upgrade since they have a ton of upgrades, or Slingers since they are a UU unique to 1 civ, but Imperial skirms would only improve the game by adding layers of complexity, some civs would have the upgrade, some won’t , some will have all upgrades for It, some won’t, some will have unique bonuses for it…instead atm all civs but 1 have elite skirms with the only difference being blacksmith upgrades…
Guess what: We can have both worlds. We can have Imperial skirms and still get buff for elephants or UUs
Also Imperial skirms are a much more interesting unit than elite skirms in Imperial age that hit like a wet noodle…those are really sad to watch. And it’s even worse when you see ES eaten by arbalest whom they are supposed to counter cause they are not FU
most civs one or more of the following:
have FU skirms
have their win condition earlier
have a different counter to arbalest (eg huskarl, tarkan, rams)
have this as an intended weakness (eg teutons)
No we can’t have both. Skirms are dirty cheap and spammable unit and buffing it undoubtedly affecting balance much. Such as Champion will be more easily killed by new imperial skirms, Many ranged UU will easily countered by new imp skirms. Many civs will not go their ranged UU (Eite Conqs, Arambai for example) and go for just their new imp skirms instead and I don’t think that is interesting change. Again, Hussar is just too versatile and overpower for trash unit. Other two trash unit is in right position.
Imp skirm is interesting because it only belong to Vietnamese. They have mediocre eco and poor melee units in imp except elephant. They need really good skirms to carry that civ. But other civ which have not great skirms either have really good eco or have other good tools to deal with ranged unit.
Nah seems like you are talking about some Crazy good unit but man Vietnamese already have them and they are nowhere remotely close to oppressive or too strong, and they even have them FU and with 20% HP extra. So there is simply no way a teuron Imperial skirms, for example, would be OP
All counters you mentioned either cost Gold or are useless against cav archers for example. Some civs have not a weakness to archers, they straight up due from archers. Like teutons or burmese. Like if you have FU CA and manage to get to imp a teuton player might as well resign…
Also yeah it’s not a matter of “need”. For example, no civ strictly “Need” hussar since light cav are perfectly serviceable, but they do get hussar nonetheless. Also there is no logic reason why of the 3 trash unit skirms should not have an Imperial age upgrade. And infact they are the weakest of all 3 in Imp
And they would probably remain the worse unit in imp even if Imperial skirms become a thing, as there will always be a worst one, but they would no more be objectively bad as elite skirms that are a Castle unit in Imperial Age…
so? archers cost gold. it’s fine if countering a unit needs gold. there is no trash counter to any of the infantry units.
scorpions? knights/cavalier with armour?
depends on the state of the game. teutons want to fight in one place and struggle with fast units. so they need to force fights by attacking. if they can do that they can still kill CA with their existing skirms+siege
then don’t change anything. only change stuff if you are clearly addressing an issue
there is also no logical reason why every unit should have an Imperial ugrade. they are the weakest depending on the situation…elite skirms are decent at what they do. halberdiers are only good when they can force fights, skirms are about the same speed as archers
elite skirms are a very hard counter to x-bows in castle age. it is good that this dynamic changes in imperial age. it forces the skirm player to press his advantage in castle, or transition into a different unit. that’s what age of empires is about: windows of opportunity and unit transitions
I agree it will not break the game. Similar to giving genitour to Spanish and Portuguese, I am not against it. I was just trying to explain why there is no upgrade for elite skirmisher.
Counters are made also trough gold efficiency. If you counter a Gold unit with another Gold unit you are not really countering that as hard as if with a trash unit. That’s why pikeman are good counters to cav since no matter what if they cath them they Will do Amazing damage for the cost, while other Gold unit like crossbows will need more investment like micro or critical mass
So it’s fare better to have a trash counter options
So teutons die from CA from the 90s because they forgot Scorpions exist? No it’s because they lack good light cav and Skirmishers, something that Imperial Skirmishers alone would not change, but would give the teuton player a honest shot
And teutons are just an example. Burmese are another, despite having literally a UT to counter archers, they die to archers aniway cause their skirms are trash
There is an issue, the fact that all generic units and especially have trash units have an imp upgrade and skirms don’t. Which breaks counter-trangle in imp and makes the unit basically bad in imp. This is a very tangible issue. If it’s an issue that you can’t see, that does not meen it’s less of and issue nonetheless
Oh but there is indeed. And it’s the fact that other units upgrades while some do not which breaks balance. If ES counters archers in Castle Age, they fail to do so in imp simply because they lack an upgrade. Missiles get arbalest and heavy CA, skirms get nothing and this they lag behind. Following your logic, we could remove halberdiers from the game since there is no need to have an imp upgrade, until you realize pikeman do not counter paladin anymore, which Is exactly what happens in imp with arbalest/heavy CA-skirmisher.
So yeah, a unit like monks which is very particular and have tons of upgrade already in the monastery does not need an upgrade since it upgrades trough monastery techs, but a generic military unit most definitely deserve an upgrade to stay on par with competitors in the Imperial Age
it’s better for the civ, but it’s not better for the game. civs having weaknesses which require skill and game knowledge to compensate is what makes the game interesting. Might as well play with all techs enabled otherwise.
yes, but that is the least relevant part for most of the game.
if you get pushed into counter-units early you will be behind, so momentum is also important. countering xbows with mangos or knights is usually stronger than skirms as you can also go on the offence with those units.
at different times of the game different resources are at a premium. eg what makes xbows so strong is that they dont need any food, as gold and wood are easy to get in early castle age.
population efficiency is also relevant. to stick with the xbow-skirm example: in castle age skirms are a hard counter to xbows, but the xbow player can make 2x the number of xbows. in imperial age skirms fall off a little, but it is no longer possible for the xbow player to just outnumber the skirm player as population limits will come into play
also mobility, their use against other units, the building that produces them, the required techs etc etc are all relevant. thinking just about gold is super reductive.
pikeman are not a good counter to knights until the knight player adds siege. but this is getting off topic. what makes pikes a decent counter against knights though is the low total cost. if they cost wood and gold they would be a much better unit in castle age
in castle age Teutons have FU skirms, so there is a clear window of opportunity here
imperial skirm would change nothing. if elite skirm without bracer dies to CA, how much will 1 extra armour and a bit more attack help? the range is the same afterall. in both cases the CA die if they engage, and can’t be caught because of the lack of range and speed. Teutons vs CA are completely irrelevant to this discussion.
this is not an issue in itself. it’s like arguing there is an issue that there is no ‘siege scorpion’, but all other standard siege weapons have 2 upgrades in imperial age. it’s just a perceived pattern that you view as ‘broken’
(btw skirms have 3 imp upgrades: bracer, ring archer armour, chemistry)
it’s not an issue though. skirms still counter arbs and CA. key upgrades missing from a unit should make it weaker. the same is true for xbows or knights. Skirms aren’t the only unit that counters arbs.
it doesn’t though. elite skirms still counter arbs. they have huge bonus damage and take relatively little damage, while also being cheaper.
FU elite skirms still easily beat arbs and CA. they do their job
don’t put words in my mouth.
firstly: nobody gets paladin in a normal 1v1
this comparison is broken in several places: firstly knights get two different upgrades in imp: cavalier and paladin, while xbows only get arbalest
secondly the difference is way bigger: xbow-> arbalest is only +1 attack and +5 hp. with bracer this is +2 attack. elite skirms get +2 pierce armour in imp
knight to cavalier is: +20 hp, +2 attack, with another +40hp and +2 attack for paladin.
also blast furnace gives +2 attack, while imperial infantry armour only gives +1 armour.
furthermore the population efficiency is different: knights win 1v1 against pikes, so you need to outnumber knights with pikes to win in castle age. in imp with pop limits this wouldn’t be possible, so pikes need an extra edge.
the exact reverse is the case with xbows-skirms. xbows lose 1v1 against elite skirms in castle age, but are easier to mass. in imperial massing skirms gets easier as you no longer need to save food for imp and gold is getting scarce for arb production. that’s why xbows get a slight edge
Sorry, but the Arb upgrade in imp is definetely bigger in effect than the cavalier upgrade.
You can try it yourself with playing the same amount of Fully Upgraded XBows vs Knights in Castle age and then again with FU Arbs vs Cavalier in Imp.
First, Arbs need only 35 hits to kill a FU Cavalier and Xbows 40 to kill a knight. What matters a bit more attack of the Cavalier if the arbs just kill more of them before they even arrive?
Second Arbs have indirectly also 1 more Range, so they have even more time to diminish the Cavalier numbers.
Then of all effects, there is also the soft factor of different army Sizes involved. And Archers drive by numbers.
Lastly I also want to mention that at this stage Gold also becomes more relevant. And Archers actually are more Gold effecitve at these later stages of the game, as you usually even field an army composition. Then the arbs have a trash meatshield whilst the Cavaliers ARE the meatshield.
Paladin is ofc different as it is so much more resistant to Archer fire. But even Paladin usually give you just one big last chance to make that all-winning push with them. After that you usually have rarely any Gold left and need to transition into full trash.
Only IF you can actually target them. If you have like 20 Halbs and 30 Skirms, you will see it’s incredibly Hard to micro down like 20 Hussar and 30 Arbs, Cause the Skirms won’t target the Arbs if they aren’t in Range.
Unfortunately you can’t really test this in a scenario editor as you need the opponent to micro reasonably, from time to time just pulling back the arbs a bit, so they aren’t in range of the skirms anymore.
Skirms become extremely hard to micro in the lategame once there are trash meatshields, especially Hussars, on the field.
Pikemen are too weak in early Castle Age, agreed. I think the upgrade cost should be reduced and creation speed slightly decreased. Perhaps reduce research speed and/or food cost of Squires. But if we buff Castle Age pikes, I think halbs should be nerfed to compensate.
Again. I already said it belongs to Vietnamese which have mediocre eco and no power unit except elephant. Teutons already have really good eco with farming bonus into Paladin and seige. Both can deal with archer.
Seige can elimiate archer that even one good shot of onager slaughter whole army of archer. It is also gold-efficient counter. Even Burmese skirms are okay to deal with ranged unit if you set up eco to endless production of them. Can’t you remember what imp unit Liereyy created by Burmese facing Villese’s Bengalis?
By the way, some civs cannot counter Paladin or good Cavarly in late game with trash unit. Italians for example their pike is not enough to deal with paladin, Konnik, Leitis etc. They also need halb on top of Genoese Crossbow? How about Aztecs? They mostly rely on monk to counter knight line. Even Hindustanis need to getting back their halb?
If you feels Seige are not enough to deal with CA. I think it is better to buff seige in general or for Teutons. Instead of making every civ to go skirms and seige becoming obsolete.
If you watch any of pro level late game. Skirms are already one of the most common unit. Not as good as hussar which should be toned down a bit.
Sorry for confused expression. I mean seige except BBC, treb like Onager line, Scorpion line. Onager is only freqently used in Black forest. Scorpion is only used in some case in castle age. Heavy Scorpion is almost never used (Even for Khmers, Ballista Elephant is better than heavy scorpion after buff.)
Well it’s not like having Imperial Skirmishers is going to cancel a civ weakness alone… teutons Imperial skirms would still lack any bonus and all Imperial Age blacksmith upgrades. They would still very much keep the weakness, just not as hard as before, which Is the same for civs which are weak to cav and have halberdiers
Problem is few civs have FU skirms, and if they lack any upgrade, they are basically no more trading ok and no more do their job. Having an Imperial upgrade would fix this and would also enhance the game via layers of complexity
Yeah and Vietnamese even without Imperial skirms have rattan Archer with 10 or so PA and siege with SE and FU elite skirms so by your logic they should not have Imperial skirms because they already have enough counters to archers, but they do have them…
Well that’s interesting too but some kind of change to the overall gameplay of some or many civs is refreshing. Especially changes to castle-uu builds would be quite nice. I don’t see how this change is just about skirm wars. Like I said it can be balanced in such a way that it favors the civs that currently struggle against strong archer civs.
Cuman paladin and celt imperial siege are basically units on maps like Black forest or Megarandom with a ton of gold. On standard maps, its not feasible to play these units in imperial age most of the time. Celts getting capped ram in castle age is just cancerous for the game. Its only going to promote more gimmicky hoang rush style gameplays rather than making it a well rounded overall civ.
Fair enough. But those civs struggle quite a bit against many other strong civs because of lacking a proper ranged unit counter. Siege as such isn’t a very good ranged unit counter on open maps beyond a certain point in the game and the addition of imperial skirmisher upgrade isn’t magically going to reverse the situation and make the civs with imp skirms broken. Its just going to help balance the late late game of certain civs.
Yes yes, Franks particularly Many civs were crazy strong back then. Chinese started with just -150 food for 3 extra vills, Teutons had +3 range on their tc, Mangudai moved, fired and were produced even faster than now. Aztecs had halberdier during the first expansion release, War wagons had 6 default range and costed like 80w 60g. People who shout broken now for Poles and Gurjaras would completely lose their minds if they played against the first version of these civs.
some good ideas, i suppose. Skirms could do with an imperial upgrade. don’t know what difference it would make having even cheaper upgrades for pikes and skirms. they are already quite cheap compared to other units’ imperial age upgrades
for me trash wars is such a buzz kill. \the whole point of playing an RTS is to eventually build the expensive and powerful units to overpower your opponent. running out of major resources in the end game is such a slap in the face. i don’t play AoE2 much anymore because of it.
this is why i prefer AoE3 (blasphemy I know). because they have mills and plantations which provide resources after natural ones run out. it’s a good solution to the trash wars issue. i don’t know why something similar hasn’t been including in any of the expansions/rereleases
Na… Instead give it to all the civs with strong archers. Civilizations like Britons, Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Aztecs, Mayans and Incas should have it… note that ALL of these lack fully upgraded hussars… or even the hussar tech.
I dunno about Lithuanians, though… might be a little too OP if they get it. Dravidians should certainly get it.
That can be done, yes but not removing Imperial skirmisher from the civs that would get them.
Many civs were crazy strong back then. Chinese started with just -150 food for 3 extra vills, Teutons had +3 range on their tc, Mangudai moved, fired and were produced even faster than now. Aztecs had halberdier during the first expansion release, War wagons had 6 default range and costed like 80w 60g. People who shout broken now for Poles and Gurjaras would completely lose their minds if they played against the first version of these civs.