What Russia Actually Needs

Age of Empires III: DE III - Discussion
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Preface:
I’ve thought a lot about balancing Russia. I think some of the buffs, while well-meaning, haven’t actually fixed the issues the civ faces. I’ve played them in team, treaty and 1v1s. I think the civ isn’t fundamentally flawed, but a combination of factors has lead to it under preforming.

Power Creep:
@dansil92 has frequently brought up the speed of new units, and I believe someone made the point that the speed and/or range of newer units have negatively impacted Strelets. 4.5 speed used to be rare, and that allowed for them to catch up to most infantry. This isn’t the case now. Additionally a number of new units have more range, meanwhile Strelets have 14 until age 4.

Bad Match Ups:
Otto vs Russia has been a horrible MU for Russia for years, but certain changes have only made it worse. Delis deal 25 damage every 1.2 seconds, this means until New Order Infantry comes in, Delis kill Strelets around 25% faster than a Hussar does. I think this is an unintentional consequence of the stat change that has a huge impact on the match up. It’s a lose-lose for Russia as it’s really hard for them to rush Otto and even worse to play into age III Otto as age II Russia.
While there are other bad MUs, most of those are less severe and should be improved by some of the suggestions in this post.

Map Pool:
The current map pool is heavy on both TP maps and most maps have high hunts. I don’t want to go back to lots of low-hunt maps, but a few maps with 10-20% less hunts and some no-TP maps would help keep some civs honest.

New Stuff:
While most civs have received new content, only a few feel like there’s a major trade off. Russia has a lot of must-have cards, and many of the buffs they have received are new cards that they don’t have space for.

Suggestions:

Strelet:

  • Cost increased to 360f, 115w (from 375f, 100w).
  • Hp increased to 95 (76 after the -20% shadow tech) (from 90/72).
  • Range increased to 15 (from 14).
  • LoS increased by 2.
  • Veteran now adds +1 range and LoS.
  • Imperial still adds +2 (18 is still the max).

Strelet Combat:

  • +15% Attack and Hitpoints (Down from 20/20%).

Strelet Horde:

  • Instead of increased range, Strelets now cost coin instead of wood (max range remains the same).

Fencing School:

  • Removed.

Dueling School:

  • Moved from Age I to III.
  • Infantry trains 50% faster and Standing Army now increases infantry training time by 40% (up from 25%).

Starting Crates:

  • Food crates are replaced with 1 crate of 500 food. (Credit for this idea @LevitexIslam)
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Edit: I decided to go through and explain the logic behind most of the suggestions.

76 Hitpoints allows Strelets to survive 4 hits from Delis (up from 3), while keeping hit numbers the same for: Hussars (3), Nagi (2), Steppe Rider (3), Cossack (3), Uhlan (3 because they only deal 35 now), Axe Rider (3), Sowar (2, I think), Chimu (4), Raider (2-3, I think), Chinaco (2).

Unfortunately, Coyotes would need 5 hits, up from 4. Given the presence of Slingers and War Ceremony this doesn’t seem as impactful. With all the Aztec nerfs though, maybe 19 damage Coyotes could be a thing to preserve the breakpoint here (that would require running a lot of numbers though).

The Range would be massively helpful in age 2-3 where almost all skirms will outrange Strelets by slightly less.

Strelet cards would need to be watched. 13 might need to become 12 and 19 might need to become 18 due to the buffs.

Since Strelets are getting buffed, I felt it necessary to nerf Strelet combat. It’s still a net buff to hp, but ends up being a slight nerf to damage.

Strelet Horde needed a new addition, and the coin change should be helpful in treaty.

Insta units are, imo, a core element of Russia’s game play. Having it tied only to 1 card is a nice buff, but I also didn’t want insta units being easily obtainable before age 4. Improving Standing Army via the card seemed like a decent work around. The card seems in-line with Inca’s train speed card (which is 45% for infantry and cavalry) or Liberation March (35% for infantry and cavalry and +5% speed).

This being an age 3 card also saves you a slot in age 2, and a slot overall in Treaty where the lack of deck space disallows some interesting upgrade cards like the melee damage for CA and Strelets or others.

As @LevitexIslam has previously explained, a 500 food crate can be gathered more quickly than 5 100 food crates. I believe because it reduces walking time. I decided not to suggest 255 food for vills batches. I think that risks buffing the rush speed too much and that the civ would be better served by a buff elsewhere.

Core Civ Asymmetry:
I think these changes would keep the core asymmetry of the civ design, a strong early and late game and a weaker middle. The +2 range no doubt makes it a less painful mid game, but that’s still only 16 range.

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I would trade everything just for Strelet to have 0.7 pop

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I understand the sentiment, but I think it would probably create problems late game due to everything being so pop efficient. Also I suspect fractional pop would create bugs and weird things with overpoping off of like 0.3 pop.

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