Well since the Wei are exactly the Jin who are related to Xianbei who later became the “Xiong Huns”, 3K definitely fits into the game’s narrative, according to some WE’s unofficial Grand Historian (if you really know Chinese history you’ll get the reference).
/s
Yes and now that they had cheerfully moved on after successes after successes, the hope to get campaigns for Khitans, Jurchens and THE REAL Chinese is now in the distant future of DEDE.
Also, they could legitimately pick really obscure characters and campaigns for the South American DLC like they had always been doing. Why didn’t they choose something more PoPUlAr like say Bolivar? Why did the “pOPuLaR” virus eat their brains only when it comes to East Asia?
Same.
Also I find it weird that 3 fractions of a former empire of 60 million people can’t be part of the game, meanwhile at least 5 civs of a similar 60 million people empire exist ingame. Must’ve missed the unwritten law where fractions must not be playable…
Considering they all lasted for more than half a century. Wow
You misunderstand me. 3K definitely doesn’t belong in the game; however, its presence hasn’t turned me off from the game completely.
In what sense? Avars were not Huns technically, the most accredited hypothesis is they came from what was left of the Rouran Khanate, almost a remake of the Xiongnu - Huns migration two centuries later. I’m not sure at what point Huns is enough for them all.
We should have upper Egyptian and lower egyptian in aoe then.
I wonder why it doesn’t use the Wei as one of the enemy players. If Wei is meant to represent not just Cao Wei but also the Xianbei, why not use it in a scenario about a Xianbei-Han conflict? If Wei is just the Cao Wei, why does it use the wonder of the Xianbei-ruled later Wei?
Italians and Byzantines didn’t last only a couple decades.
Wu&Wei&Shu CAN be reworked to represent longer-lasting cultures (Wuyue/Jiangnanese, Xianbei, Ba-Shu/Sichuanese) but so far they are heavily 3K-themed with only some elements borrowed ahistorically from later periods. And even then you’d probably need to rename the existing Chinese to reduce the overlap.
The 3K civs seriously violate the long-established definition of civ within the base game. Not gonna elaborate on this point.
The campaigns of 3K civs can hardly be described as interesting, and the way they are presented also has shortcomings. If a player does not already understand the story of the Three Kingdoms, even after playing through the campaigns they may still have only a vague grasp of this period and no real understanding of the heroes.
For comparison, the campaigns of Lithuanians and Poles are the complete opposite: their stories are engaging and moving, and the heroes are vividly portrayed and highly impressive.
In terms of historical accuracy, Wei clearly incorporates a large number of Xianbei elements wrongly, and the other two factions are not much better. The balance design is also unappealing: Wei is forced to rely too heavily on melee cavalry; Shu’s archer-based playstyle feels overly strong to me; Wu’s jian swordsman rush is obnoxious; not to mention that the very inclusion of traction trebuchets and trainable heroes is itself controversial.
In addition, many of the gimmicks are also half-baked or poorly crafted. For example, the devs introduced the lingering fire mechanic but didn’t apply it to the Fire Archer, where it would be most fitting; instead, they gave it a silly range gimmick. it makes no sense that the Fire Archer’s range can exceed that of the castle itself, yet it cannot target non-building at the same range.
The designs of the Jurchens and the Khitans also feel contrived.
Emphasizing the gunpowder identity for the Jurchens isn’t inherently bad, but making it unique for the sake of uniqueness, overly highlighting gunpowder, causes them to lose their decent archers and easily massed heavy cavalry, which were historically their defining features. It feels strange and unconventional that soldiers with such a special ability to throw explosives are placed in such ordinary buildings like archery ranges, while fairly typical heavy cavalry are confined to castles.
The rationale for giving them Fortified Bastions is also questionable. They were not historically known for building strong defensive fortresses. Thunderclap Bombs should be sufficient to reflect the fact that they used gunpowder to defend from the Mongols. A more appropriate UT for them would be one that makes up their poor archers and mounted archers that lack key upgrades.
The Khitans are an even bigger mess… Infantry is the least historically accurate identity they could have assumed. Not to mention, more than half of their elements actually belong to the Tanguts.
The dao was used throughout mainland East Asia, but the Khitans never achieved any notable accomplishments specifically because of it. In fact, it was the Chinese who effectively used two-handed dao in actual combat, such as podao or zhanmadao, against the Khitans and Jurchens. When a Google search for “Liao Dao” returns almost nothing but AoE2-related information and a single modern replica named after it, you know something is off. I’d say Liao Dao doesn’t deserve to be its UU. Where are their cataphract archers/crossbowmen?
Agree. Even Khitans and Jurchens fit the theme, the DLC design itself shows the lack of passion and dedication. Dunno why DLCs since V&V shows this trait.
I hate and despise 3K being added to the game. Every time I saw any CC shows a match that has 3k in it, I just drop it and move on. 3K aren’t even civs, they are antiquity political factions that didn’t even last that long. Seeing streamers keep calling wu,shu,wei as civs just pisses me off because they clearly don’t know or don’t care. And they wonder why aoe 2 viewership has been going down ever since 3k was released.
I wish streamers would put their values ahead of money and actually directly speak out against the 3K “civs” and the devs’ stupidity. If you don’t have your moral character, you have nothing; selling out your values to support yourself is worse than being penniless (and I know a thing or two about that, believe me). I’d rather be broke all over again than give up the things I stand for.
I stopped watching all tournaments after 3K was released. And I won’t watch or support any until they are dealt with.
Only Ornlu spoke about it I guess.
Omlu talked about but not really criticized it. Neither hera nor Viper criticized 3K, and I understand because it’s part of their jobs to play the game. Sadly, people who have voices don’t want to speak and people who want to speak don’t get their voices heard by the dev.
I’d rather too. Though, after what happened to Age of Noob I can see why they try to avoid criticizing anything. The way AoN was defenestrated suggests a culture of “Yes, sir” inside WE.
All the more reason for them to speak up. You should be able to sacrifice everything for the sake of what’s right, and allowing someone else’s sacrifice to go unavenged is cowardly.
It seems like the 3k were an afterthought, they won’t probably show outside of their campaign. It feels so strange and pointless. What were they thinking? Idk
From a perspective of competitive gameplay, those civs are really good and solid at the same time not broken. A couple of civs meant for hybrid maps, a couple of them for passive land maps and one top tier for open land maps. That’s a great mix. The civs are also quite asymmetrical while having all the necessary tools. While each of them have some very good new regional and unique units all of them lack something important as well to make sure none of them are too overpowered in a wide range of settings. Because of all these reasons I’d say The Three Kingdoms is an excellent DLC from ranked game perspective, and much better compared to some of its predecessors like The Mountain Royals which had to struggle longer with imbalance.