For me, the mezo civs are the worst design. They don´t fit in the medivial setting and replacing the whole cavalry with somthing like a huskarl as standard barrack unit is a fail by itself for me. And besides that, barely a civ is more difficult to balance - only Cumans with their feudal tc have come close to that. IT has a reason, why mezo civs had so many changes in the last patches, some of them were very significant (removing obsidian arrows, nerfing Aztec ece, inva vill bonus startin in ca…). Mezos are strong and can be fun to play, but they willalways suck designwise in that game.
Would have deserved an honorable mention on this list before the nerf. When 80% of what the civ has to offer is never used because you can end games in feudal by forcing the opponent into a mirror strat that is stacked in your favour there is a problem.
1 Like
Talking only about balance (not historical accuracy or architectural stuff): First to name obviously Burgundians (eco totally op, military consits only of heavy cav, gunpowder and villagers, flemish militia absolute misplaced in the game) and Sicilians (not as bad as Burgundians but pretty uninspiring: eco bonuses seem reasonable but the whole civ focuses on either that less bonus dmg bonus or serjeants).
Rgearding other civs there is quite some stuff to name but to me I strongly dislike Britons’s design. Not because of the heavy archer focus but because like half of their bonuses gives extra range to archers: As a civ bonus in castle and imp; as a unique tech; their UU is an archer with extra range. These bonuses have been there forever but still it’s just a bad design imo.
I kinda agree about paper money but other than that Vietnamese is totally different from Maya or Britons imo. Britons and Mayans are archers and infantry civs while Vietnamse is a more flexible archer civ that can choose between cavalry (and no I’m not talking elephants 11) or infantry as additional units and also has bbc.
On arabia they play out kinda generic but they have decent enough bonuses to be an okayish civ. And please no, this civ has so many interesting bonuses and is so much more fun to play than the standard one-trick Franks, Mayans, Britons and so on. It’s just that on arabia these bonuses might not come into play. Still on maps like arena you can see them a lot. Cheaper age up, cheaper university techs, UU archer with bonus vs cav, cheaper gunpowder, condotiero on top of super open tech tree. That’s a lot of bonuses and on closed maps it’s a very good and flexible civ.
Yes, this would make so much more sense than the current one.
Yeah problem is with that eco Burgundians can have paladin before Lith have cavalier 11
It’s a weird design but I like it. Different and strong at the same time. Light cav counter archers. Camels counter knights. Ca counter pikes. Great eco for booming and making cav at the same time. Very interesting and fun to play imo.
1 Like
For me the honourable mention would be Saracens… also not really the best civ, they get a nice market abuse, but it’s not really an earth-shatteringly great game-plan. Before the nerf, I think the Inca civ was fine, had a clear game-plan and strength in my opinion. Most civs don’t see most of their tech trees used anyhow, that’s just the way it is. Most civs will go towards the strategy that specifically favours them.
In terms of gameplay and theme: Slavs, Italians, Portuguese, Lithuanians, Bulgarians. My issue with all of these is essentially the same. The European civs from AoK and The Conquerors covered all of the main archetypes of medieval European warfare very well. Consequently, there was nothing new left for these civs and so they ended up reusing the same themes, but presented in slightly different ways. The result is that they just seem quite bland to me. I think they finally got over this and actually had some new, interesting ideas with Burgundians and Sicilians, but it feels like a lot of people disagree and hate those civs.
If we’re talking in terms of history though, it has to be Celts! Gameplay wise they’re ok, but historically they’re utterly nonsensical. They’re supposed to represent medieval Scots and Irish, but they’re based on a cartoonish idea of Iron Age Celts, with an inexplicable focus on siege weapons. Furor Celtica’s name and description have nothing to do with its effect. They lack plate barding and ring archer armour because some Roman guy claimed he once saw some Gauls go into battle naked. But the thing that really gets me is that they don’t get Illumination!
That reminds me of Kataparuto, simply a romanized version of an Engrish word, and made no sense historically.
At least kataparuto kinda makes sense because the Japanese did have their own mangonels/trebuchets like weapon, but then the Celts, who used cannons irl, have everything but BBC 11
1 Like
What do you mean by Celts used cannons in real life?
Uh I meant the Scots. The game kinda mix up the two so I messed up.
1 Like
In the History section, If I’mnot mistaken, It mentions that a Scottish King died due to a misfired hand cannon or something similar 11
1 Like
I used the Vierklee Woad Raider mod and pretended it was Gallowglass.
1 Like
I think there are a handful of factions that are really poorly designed in this game, but the Vietnamese take the cake for me: not only do they get Paper Money, possibly the worst designed UT in the game, both of their UUs have the EXACT same role in the game: a ranged anti-archer unit -.-.
1 Like
For me easily Cumans.
Because their feudal TC bonus is so hard to balance that is either OP or worthless, also siege workshop in feudal is rather useless as well, yes you can build siege workshop as you age to castle but it makes sense only if you’ll go all-in. Capped ram in castle age is useful I won’t deny it.
I can’t comment on Sicilians and Burgundians because I don’t have that DLC.
3 Likes
by far burgundians and sicilians.
sicilians - take the most carefully balanced mechanic in the game - the bonus damage, and completely wipe that on the floor for this one particular civ. this is by far the strongest bonus in the game, so it had to be balanced by having by far the most boring tech tree in the game. basically, you are left with an unbalanced civ that can barely build an advantage, but cant lose an advantage once it has it. the castle drop bonus also supports that stupid niche. and i didnt even get started with their UU and UT.
Burgundians - do i really need to say anything? beyond the stupid techs (yes, both of them), charge attack is a bad idea that shouldnt have been added to the game. it will always either be useless or OP, unless its just a minor buff (like ~3 attack on a 10 attack unit), but then its just uninspiring. the whole mish-mash between the ages can just never be balanced, coz the separation gbetween the ages is also something that has been carefully balanced in this game. the flemish revolution makes it so that they can never be balanced against other cavalry civs. seriously, why give flemish militia a bonus attack against cavalry specifically? this just creates a situation that is impossible to balance.
Cumans are also mehh though they can be salvaged. i just dont like the idea of mixing up the ages. its hard to balance, and so far has always been either useless (like the cuman feudal rams or the initial burgundian eco bonus) or completely OP (like the original cumans 2nd TC or the burgundian cavaliers).
burmese are just boring coz they rely too heavily on their UU. i dislike civs that are like that. even mongols and koreans have other things going for them.
Indians are just badly designed for 1v1 and should be mixed with saracens.
4 Likes
Nice to see that many player seen to hate the new civs, because of their gimmicky design. I hope this thread is a wake up call for the devs to just stop with putting these gimmicks into the game.
Indians are probably high on the list for missing knights, which make them akward to play, combined with it is an umbrella civs and people seem to want them to split up.
2 Likes
For me → Byzantians and Saracens
Both are the OG civs from the very beginning and they are not that much interesting & thought through.
I think a rework would suit them well. Byzantians strenght shouldn’t be massing trash units as they were wealthy nation for a long time. Saracens lacks interesting bonuses as well.
1 Like
Sizikian and burgunandian for their one time unique techs.
Lithu for their relic bonus
Burmese for being by far my least favourite civ to play, just nothing relally good about them
And lastly brits for their stupidly long ranged archers.
1 Like
I’m surprised Goths aren’t at least top 3.
2 Likes
Goths are bad at pro level so who cares 11
Almost no one on this forum is at a pro level. Or even close to it.
1 Like