Before posting I found 2 or 3 topics about the same matter but they all seemed quite old (december of february) so here’s my 2 cents:
I feel like the game is becoming more and more slow, defense-oriented and booming is way too easy.
At the moment a player builds a stone wall, EVERY game turns the same. You can’t destroy it without siege units, but the time to build the production building + them + to gather the resources the ennemy can boom EASILY. No need for strategy, micro or anything. Build a wall and a castle and you control the game
Another problem: you think a trebuchet would do the job? Nope… Juste put a few vills to repair the wall or the keep and it’s immortal unless you have 2 or 3 trebuchets. This is ridiculous.
A few ideas to solve the problem:
Stone walls should be breakable by all units (or just removed from the game :D)
Keeps should definitely be more expensive or less resistant, their defensive power is WAY too strong
Well this is what ppl wanted. They wanted to nerf siege to ground and they got what they wanted so we’re left on more boom oriented type of play where siege is not mobile enough to be used and its easier to wall off everything thanks to it
Nah, theyre fine, you can snipe repair villagers and walls drop quick if you have 4+ siege engines with your army…
The real issue is that base area resources are too abundant.
We should reduce the amounts of gold/wood/stone that spawn near a player’s base and players will be forced to expand outward.
Or maybe add building decay by 5% every century that passes in game
That’s my whole point: avoid these loooong games slowed by walls and keeps, going inevitably to 3 TC, forcing you to build 3 trebuchets or to go to age 4. And avoid these identical fights with two armies behind their keeps.
But maybe you’re right. At least I’m happy to know I’m not the only one feeling it…
They could make stone walls available by castle age for most civs.
Or increase the price to build them, but if theres less near-base resources booming without offensive expansion to mid map becomes much less viable.
Similar to starcraft 2nd bases
I don’t see games playing out as you describe. Stone walling a large area needs a lot of villager time to collect the stone and build the walls. If they make a small stone wall, they will quickly run out of resources inside the small walled in area. If they make a large stone wall, it cannot all be protected by one castle, and it’s a huge investment. The opponent’s investment in a few rams that can break through it may even be smaller than the investment in building the wall, and when the rams have broken through, they remain useful for destroying buildings inside the base. If it’s a large wall, it’s not easy for villagers to quickly reach the wall to repair it if you attack in multiple places at once. If it’s a small wall and easy to repair, see earlier comment about running out of resources.
Villagers are vulnerable while building walls, and you should have more military as you haven’t collected stone, so you should be able to win fights where villagers are building.
You can force them to come out from inside their walls by taking sacred sites, and you should have more military than them at the sites if they have made a wall and castle and you haven’t.
it shows that you are new, the longest best of 5 in the entire franchise was between Marinelord and Beastyqt before they nerfed the siege, how do you explain that
A keep cost 800 stone and a TC 350, this means you can only build a keep and walls, or a keep and TC, or a TC and walls with the initial stone vein.
Being second and even third TC meta right now, this means that if someone is able to collect enough stone to put a TC, or even a third TC, put a keep, and a lot of stone walls… Dude what do you want?
If you let someone collect and build that amount of things then don’t cry later. Meta favors multiple TC because it will accelerate your economy, but meta also favors the guy who has more control over the map.
In maps that is easy to close, when I see someone collecting stone and then putting stone walls to close his base, just put a stone wall in front of his stone wall and get the whole map and all the sacred sites, if you lost even doing things like this then you are so so bad and stone walls are not the problem.
I think a proper nerf to walls is to triple the time it takes to build; keep their stock HP’s. So for palisade walls go from 4s per segment to 12s per segment! And for stone walls from 12s per segment to 36s!
This will make walls a proactive establishment instead of reactionary; and it will force more expose gameplay.
The Keep 40s additional build time is significant for everyone except China…
OFF TOPIC
I also wish TC range gets nerfed from 8 tile range to 7 tile range; Logic being stone/gold needs to be completely exposed on ALL standard landmaps; this will encourage early aggression.
I think walling completely the base takes time and many dedicated citizens. If we talk about team games the time is often there, if you talk about 1vs1 rarely happened to me to see stone walls because generally I play aggressively, I do not give time to booming to my opponent, he must respond to the aggression or die. And one thing I often do in team games is cut down some trees around walls to let the army pass, they often don’t notice it. Be creative, don’t go with tunnel vision
i agree with you mostly specially wooden walls needs to be have a low hp its hard to pass them if you want early raid.
lets come to stone walls im not so sure maybe their hp can lower but they shouldnt be get attack by normal units and maybe they should stay the same because your soldiers can build the thing called siege towers to get top on the wall
instead nerfing keeps i think siege units needs to cost less
The problem with stone walls comes mainly in feudal. If for some reason you get walled in your base using stone by the enemy in feudal, then you have a big problem.
Also the typical stone wall+door to place english archers on top.
Take the best of both. Stone walls already build fairly slowly, but are available before there’s siege to deal with them, which imo doesn’t make for good gameplay. Whereas palisades are simply spam fest too quickly, especially since they immediately block movement.
So even a lowly player like myself can still essentially quick wall by dumping segments and semi building each one. And focusing on which ones are Priority.
This detracts players in the long run, and makes competitive play less interesting. Both of these impact the financial viability of the game. It already doesn’t have a great viewer market
Are you playing a different game? Please explain this cost analysis for us. And be a little more honest, it isn’t just 4+ siege, it’s 4+ trebs or cannons. It’s not like mangos or springs are going to break a wall. And since the nerfs rams are fairly niche.
Choke point maps exist. So it’s not even like the walling is that big of an investment. From the sounds of it seem people are conflating Arabia with French pass
I’m not talking about a beginner walling his entire base. Most of the time, you just have to build segments between forests or mountains. After that, yeah… try to get creative. It is exactly the opposite, you have to build siege to hope to maybe break it at some point. In the meantime your opponent gets to Age4 etc…
Don’t focus so much on walls, the most irritating point is really the keep. Usually even for map control, the first one building a keep gets the advantage. It is SO hard to break even with siege. I don’t even talk about the archers and stuff being put on a wall or other tower rush, I think you know all that already.
Just to be clear about this whole matter, I consider myself an experimented player. When I play 1v1 I usually push hard on the opponent so the wall/keep issue is there but not at every game > but again, it demands me LOTS of risk and harassment compared to the booming player.
But nowadays I play mostly 2v2 and EVERY game I see the same pattern : I push, but at some point keeps and walls are built somewhere (usually by the player I’m not attacking) and here we go again. Defensive strats are easier and safer.
To finish, I played mostly AoM and Aoe3, and I remember that chosing to boom was a RISKY strategy, like any other. Now just build a few segments walls, and you’re good. No direct fights before a long time. Here booming is definitely the safest way. Players way below my level can make a game last 40+ mn because of this. (Yes you can also tell I suck )
People have already covered this in this very thread.
If enemy walls, put up your own wall.
Attack on multiple fronts, they cant defend as easily if you dont just send units at 1 choke point.
Use siege tower to sneak units onto a wall while you have army with ram attack another section of wall.
Ram costs wood and doesnt require forward siege workshops.
Ram doesnt take a lot of longbow damage in feudal age.
Walls are balanced, the problem is too many near-base resources, allowing players to turtle and not have to expand to the center of the map.
No0bs always have tunnel vision and only attack 1 spot on a wall.
Stone walls already cost a lot of time and stone and villager use.
If enemy gets to castle, you should have time to castle as well unless they are walling and pressuring you simultaneously.
If you reach castle, trebs can snipe walls and keeps from very far away with a little protection. There are enough different strategies to make for good gameplay. People need to stop relying on meta youtube videos, and pros are usually under tons of pressure from the early stages of game, just like in aoe2 where bases had buildings form walls, its multitasking that wins the day.
If youre pressuring the enemy wall, try building your own wall back at base. Should give you time to boom if they are booming too.
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